PUBLISHED: 09:30 EDT, 27 October 2019 | UPDATED: 10:49 EDT, 28 October 2019
Donald Trump announced Sunday morning that ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi ‘died like a dog’ as the result of a U.S. Special Ops forces raid on his hideout in northwest Syria.
‘Last night the United State brought the world’s number one terrorist leader to justice. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is dead,’ Trump said from the Diplomatic Reception Room, where just a week earlier he announced a ceasefire between Turkey and the Kurds.
‘He was the founder and leader of ISIS, the most ruthless and violent terror organization anywhere in the world,’ he continued as he described the events of the raid.
Al-Baghdadi, the president confirmed, detonated his suicide vest, killing himself and three children, during an overnight targeted attack in Syria’s Idlib province.
The president touted the operation and al-Baghdadi’s death as ‘bigger than bin Laden.’ Osama bin Laden, founder of Al-Qaeda and the terrorist leader behind the September 11 terrorist attacks, was killed in 2011 during a Navy SEALs operation during Barack Obama’s presidency.
‘This is the biggest there is. This is the worst ever. Osama bin Laden was big, but Osama bin Laden became big with the World Trade Center. This is a man who built a whole, as he would like to call it, a country,’ Trump said, referencing al-Baghdadi’s creation of the Islamic State.
Donald Trump addressed the nation Sunday morning, confirming that the death of ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. He said he had watched and monitored the whole operation Saturday night
Meeting in the situation room Saturday night (from left to right): National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien, Vice President Mike Pence, Trump, Secretary of Defense Mark Esper and Joint Chiefs of Staff U.S. Army General Mark Milley and Brig. General Marcus Evans
Trump also referred to al-Baghdadi and those who followed him as ‘losers,’ and lauded that no U.S. personnel were lost during the raid. He did say, however, that one ‘talented canine’ was injured.
‘I got to watch much of it. No personnel were lost in the operation, while a large number of Baghdadi’s fighters and companions were killed with him,’ Trump said during his rare Sunday morning remarks.
‘He died after running into a dead-end tunnel, whimpering and crying and screaming all the way,’ Trump continued, adding that Baghdadi drug three of his children with him. ‘They were led to certain death.’
‘He reached the end of the tunnel as our dogs chased him down. He ignited his vest, killing himself and the three children. His body was mutilated by the blast. the tunnel had caved in on it, in addition. But test results gave certain, immediate and totally positive identification. It was him. The thug who tried so hard to intimidate others spent his last moments in utter fear, in total panic and dread, terrified of the American forces bearing down on him,’ he detailed.
he White House confirmed that Trump watched and listened to the operations unfold in the Situation room Saturday night – Sunday morning Syria time – with National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien, Vice President Mike Pence, Secretary of Defense Mark Esper and Joint Chiefs of Staff U.S. Army General Mark Milley and Brig. General Marcus Evans.
The president said, while claiming he’s been looking for Baghdadi ever since assuming office, that he’s potentially the only one better at ‘using the internet’ than ISIS forces.
‘A couple of weeks ago they were able to scope him out,’ Trump said of the U.S. intelligence community.
‘You know, these people are very smart, they are not into the use of cell phones any more. They’re very technically brilliant,’ the president said in reference to those working for ISIS.
‘You know, they use the internet better than almost anybody in the world, perhaps other than Donald Trump,’ he continued. ‘But they use the internet incredibly well and what they’ve done with the internet through recruiting and everything – and that is why he died like a dog, he died like a coward. He was whimpering, screaming and crying, and frankly I think it’s something that should be brought out so that his followers and all of these young kids that want to leave various countries – including the United States – they should see how he died. He didn’t die a hero, he died a coward – crying, whimpering, and screaming and bringing three kids with him to die. Certain death.’
The president teased Saturday night, ‘Something very big has just happened!’ and the White House also announced that night that the president would be ‘making a major statement’ Sunday morning from the White House.
Trump said he does not regret his decision to withdraw U.S. troops from northern Syria, which opened the way for Turkey to invade and target Kurdish forces.
Caliphate leader: Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi detonated his own suicide vest during the targeted raid on his lair in Syria’s Idlib province and killed three of his children in the blast. He is shown in a still from a video released in April, having not been seen since he spoke at the Grand Mosque in Mosul in 2014
Syrians ride a motorcycle past a burnt vehicle near the site where a helicopter gunfire reportedly killed nine people near the northwestern Syrian village of Barisha
Al-Baghdadi arrived at the area of the raid 48 hours beforehand, Turkish officials said – and the CIA assisted in locating him.
Information is now emerging over how the U.S. was able to track down Baghdadi, including details of his whereabouts from two inside informants.
A senior Iraqi intelligence official told the Associated Press that a few months ago an Iraqi aide to al-Baghdadi was killed in western Iraq by a U.S. airstrike, and his wife was arrested and handed over to Iraqi authorities.
The official indicated that the wife ended up being a key source of information on al-Baghdadi’s whereabouts. The Iraqis who had her in custody were ultimately able to pass along to the U.S. coordinates on al-Baghdadi through information they learned from the aide’s wife.
A second Iraqi security official said al-Baghdadi’s brother-in-law was recently arrested by the Iraqis and also gave information on Baghdadi’s whereabouts
The ISIS leader’s two wives, who were both wearing explosive devices that never detonated, were taken down. Several of his children were taken from the lair and are still alive. Several others were killed in the attack.
Trump said more people were killed than captured, but confirmed there are some in U.S. custody.
Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) confirmed on Sunday they had worked with the U.S. on a ‘successful’ operation against Islamic State.
‘Our strong and effective operations once again confirm our strength and determination to go after (Islamic State),’ the head of the SDF’s media office said.
The Syrian Democratic Forces is an alliance in the Syrian Civil War made up of primarily Kurdish, Arab and Assyrian/Syriac militias.
SDF General Commander Mazloum Abdi took partial credit for taking down al-Baghdadi, but also thanked the president and U.S. Army in its efforts, which he said have been under way for almost half-a-year.
‘For five months there has been joint intel cooperation on the ground and accurate monitoring, until we achieved a joint operation to kill Abu Bakir al-Baghdadi. Thanks to everybody who participate in this great mission,’ Abdi tweeted, tagging Donald Trump’s Twitter account.
Al-Baghdadi, the leader of the so-called Islamic caliphate, blew himself up during the targeted attack on his lair in Syria’s Idlib province in the early hours of Sunday morning. His lair was in a village known for smuggling, and he arrived there 48 hours before the raid
The president also thanked those who had assisted in finding al-Baghdadi, participated in the raid and brought him to his death. He said that while the Kurds provided information that was useful in taking down al-Baghdadi, they did not assist in the military operations.
The ISIS leader has been among U.S. and Europe’s force’s most wanted figures since his chilling call to arms in 2014, which saw a shift away from the mass casualty attacks carried out by al-Qaeda in favor of smaller-scale acts of violence.
Shifting away from the airline hijackings and other mass-casualty attacks that came to define al-Qaeda, al-Baghdadi encouraged smaller-scale acts of violence that would be harder for law enforcement to prepare for and prevent.
He encouraged jihadists who could not travel to the caliphate to instead kill where they were using whatever weapon they had at their disposal, resulting in a series of devastating attacks in the UK and Europe.
His words inspired more than 140 terrorist attacks in 29 countries other than Iraq and Syria, resulting in the deaths of at least 2,043 people, CNN reports.
Since 2016, the State Department has offered a reward of up to $25 million for information or intelligence that could lead to Baghdadi’s capture or death.
Al-Baghdadi led ISIS for the last five years, presiding over its ascendancy as it cultivated a barbaric reputation for beheadings and horrific executions.
These recordings, often noted for their high production values, were distributed online along with the ISIS propaganda magazine Dabiq.
He remained among the few ISIS commanders still at large despite multiple claims in recent years about his death and even as his so-called caliphate dramatically shrank, with many supporters who joined the cause either imprisoned or jailed.
A picture taken on October 27, 2019 shows a burnt vehicle at the site where a helicopter gunfire killed nine people near the northwestern Syrian village of Barisha in the province of Idlib near the border with Turkey
Trump teased, without explanation on Saturday that ‘Something very big has just happened!’ and the White House confirmed the president would be addressing the nation on Sunday morning
With a £19.5 million ($25m) bounty on his head, al-Baghdadi had been far less visible in recent years, releasing only sporadic audio recordings, including one just last month in which he called on members of the extremist group to do all they could to free ISIS detainees and women held in jails and camps.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported an attack carried out by a squadron of eight helicopters accompanied by a warplane.
The attacks were on positions where ISIS operatives were believed to be hiding in the Barisha area north of Idlib city, after midnight on Saturday-Sunday.
It said the helicopters targeted ISIS positions with heavy strikes for about 120 minutes, during which jihadists targeted the helicopters with heavy weapons.
The Syrian Observatory documented the death of nine people as a result of the coalition helicopter attack, adding that the death toll is likely to rise due to the presence of a large number of wounded.
The strike came amid concerns that a recent American pullback from northeastern Syria could infuse new strength into the militant group, which had lost vast stretches of territory it had once controlled.
The purported audio was his first public statement since last April, when he appeared in a video for the first time in five years.
Reports suggest that al-Baghdadi, the elusive militant who has been the subject of an international manhunt for years, had been killed in Idlib, Syria
In 2014, he was a black-robed figure delivering a sermon from the pulpit of Mosul’s Great Mosque of al-Nuri, his only known public appearance.
He urged Muslims around the world to swear allegiance to the caliphate and obey him as its leader.
‘It is a burden to accept this responsibility to be in charge of you,’ he said in the video.
‘I am not better than you or more virtuous than you. If you see me on the right path, help me. If you see me on the wrong path, advise me and halt me. And obey me as far as I obey God.’
The death of such a high-value U.S. target comes amid a difficult political backdrop for Trump, who has been frustrated heavy media focus on the Democratic-led impeachment inquiry, which he calls a bipartisan smear.
He has also faced withering criticism from both Republicans and Democrats alike for his U.S. troop withdrawal from northeastern Syria, which permitted Turkey to attack America’s Kurdish allies.
The rise and fall of the Islamic State
The Islamic State group erupted from the chaos of Syria and Iraq’s conflicts, declaring itself a ‘caliphate’ after conquering a giant stretch of territory.
Its territorial rule, which at its height in 2014 stretched across nearly a third of both Syria and Iraq, ended in March with a last stand by several hundred of its militants at a tiny Syrian village on the banks of the Euphrates near the border with Iraq.
But the militants have maintained a presence in both countries, and their shadowy leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi had continued releasing messages urging them to keep up the fight.
Here are the key moments in the rise and fall of the Islamic State group:
Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi – who was also known as Caliph Ibrahim – released a propaganda video in 2014 where he addressed Muslim worshipers at a mosque in Mosul
April 2013 –Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi announces the merger of his group with al-Qaeda’s franchise in Syria, forming the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant.
January 2014 – Al-Baghdadi’s forces overrun the city of Fallujah in Iraq’s western Anbar province and parts of the nearby provincial capital of Ramadi. In Syria, they seize sole control of the city of Raqqa after driving out rival Syrian rebel factions, and it becomes their de facto capital.
February 2014 – Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahri disavows al-Baghdadi after the Iraqi militant ignores his demands that IS leave Syria.
June 2014 – IS captures Mosul, Iraq’s second-largest city, and pushes south as Iraqi forces crumble, eventually capturing Saddam Hussein’s hometown of Tikrit and reaching the outskirts of Baghdad. When they threaten Shiite holy sites, Iraq’s top Shiite cleric issues a call to arms, and masses of volunteers, largely backed and armed by Iran, join militias.
June 29, 2014 – The group renames itself the Islamic State and declares the establishment of a self-styled ‘caliphate’ in its territories in Iraq and Syria. Al-Baghdadi is declared the caliph.
July 4, 2014 – Al-Baghdadi makes his first public appearance, delivering a Friday sermon in Mosul’s historic al-Nuri Mosque. He urges Muslims around the world to swear allegiance to the caliphate and obey him as its leader.
August 2014 – IS captures the town of Sinjar west of Mosul and begins a systematic slaughter of the tiny Yazidi religious community. Women and girls are kidnapped as sex slaves; hundreds remain missing to this day.
August 8, 2014 – The U.S. launches its campaign of airstrikes against IS in Iraq.
September 22, 2014 – The U.S.-led coalition begins an aerial campaign against IS in Syria.
January, 2015 – Iraqi Kurdish fighters, backed by U.S.-led airstrikes, drive IS out of several towns north of Mosul. In Syria, Kurdish fighters backed by U.S. airstrikes repel an IS onslaught on the town of Kobani on the border with Turkey, the first significant defeat for IS.
April 1, 2015 – U.S.-backed Iraqi forces retake Tikrit, their first major victory against IS.
May 20, 2015 – IS captures the ancient Syrian town of Palmyra, where the extremists later destroy archaeological treasures.
February 9, 2016 – Iraqi forces recapture Ramadi after months of fighting and at enormous cost, with thousands of buildings destroyed. Almost the entire population fled the city.
June 26, 2016 – Fallujah is declared liberated by Iraqi forces after a five-week battle.
July 3, 2016 – IS sets off a gigantic suicide truck bomb outside a Baghdad shopping mall, killing almost 300 people, the deadliest attack in Iraq since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.
October 17, 2016 – Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi announces the start of the operation to liberate Mosul.
Iraqi Army soldiers celebrate as they hold an IS flag, which they captured during a raid on a village outside Mosul in November 2016
November 5, 2016 – The U.S.-backed, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces launch Operation Euphrates Wrath, the first of five operations aiming to retake Raqqa, starting with an encircling of the city.
January 24, 2017 – Al-Abadi announces eastern Mosul has been ‘fully liberated’.
May 10, 2017 – SDF captures the strategic Tabqa dam after weeks of battles and a major airlift operation that brought SDF fighters and their U.S. advisers to the area. The fall of the dam facilitated the push on Raqqa, about 25 miles away.
June 6, 2017 – SDF fighters begin an attack on Raqqa from three sides, backed by U.S.-led coalition airstrikes.
June 18, 2017 – Iraqi forces launch battle for Mosul’s Old City, the last IS stronghold there.
June 21, 2017 – IS destroys Mosul’s iconic al-Nuri Mosque and its 12th century leaning minaret as Iraqi forces close in.
July 10, 2017 – Iraqi PM declares victory over IS in Mosul and end of the extremists’ caliphate in Iraq.
October 17, 2017 – SDF takes full control of Raqqa after months of heavy bombardment that devastates the city.
September – December, 2017 – Syrian government forces, backed by Russian air power and Iranian forces, recapture IS territory on the western bank of the Euphrates River, seizing the cities of Deir el-Zour, Mayadin and Boukamal on the border with Iraq.
Isis lost its hold over Mosul in July 2017 but the city suffered severe bombing
August 23, 2018 – IS leader al-Baghdadi resurfaces in his first purported audio recording in almost a year; he urges followers to ‘persevere’ and continue fighting.
September 10, 2018 – SDF launches a ground offensive, backed by U.S.-led coalition airstrikes, to take the last territory held by IS in Syria’s eastern province of Deir el-Zour.
March 23, 2019 – SDF declares the complete capture of Baghouz and the end of the Islamic State group’s territorial ‘caliphate’.
October 27, 2019 – President Donald Trump announced that al-Baghdadi was killed during a US. Special Ops forces raid on his hideout in northwest Syria. Trump said the ‘violent terror leader’ died after running into a dead-end tunnel, and detonating his suicide vest, killing himself and three of his children.
Story 2: Delusional Democrats Still Pushing Impeachment Despite No Evidence of High Crimes and Misdemeanors — Videos —
Varney: Dems still pushing impeachment despite al-Baghdadi triumph
Trump blasts Adam Schiff: ‘He’s a corrupt politician’
Trump calls impeachment inquiry a ‘lynching’
Story 3: Joe Biden The Marathon Man For President — Videos
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UPDATED DATA 10/28/2019
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AMONG DEMOCRATIC VOTERSJan-13-201917-Feb24-Mar28-Apr2-Jun7-Jul11-Aug15-Sep20-Oct0%10%20%30%40%
Second Choices: Where Voters Could Migrate
After voters registered their first choice, they were asked a follow-up about whom they would choose as a second option. The results below show where the supporters for a selection of leading candidates could go next. Hover over or click cards to see more.
BIDEN SUPPORTERS
Elizabeth Warren
U.S. Senator
BIDEN SUPPORTERS
Second Choice Selections
Elizabeth Warren
28%
Bernie Sanders
26%
Pete Buttigieg
9%
WARREN SUPPORTERS
Bernie Sanders
U.S. Senator
WARREN SUPPORTERS
Second Choice Selections
Bernie Sanders
28%
Joe Biden
25%
Pete Buttigieg
14%
SANDERS SUPPORTERS
Joe Biden
Former Vice President
SANDERS SUPPORTERS
Second Choice Selections
Joe Biden
30%
Elizabeth Warren
28%
Kamala Harris
6%
BUTTIGIEG SUPPORTERS
Elizabeth Warren
U.S. Senator
BUTTIGIEG SUPPORTERS
Second Choice Selections
Elizabeth Warren
28%
Joe Biden
20%
Bernie Sanders
11%
HARRIS SUPPORTERS
Elizabeth Warren
U.S. Senator
HARRIS SUPPORTERS
Second Choice Selections
Elizabeth Warren
25%
Joe Biden
22%
Bernie Sanders
14%
Tracking Name Recognition and Favorability
Respondents were asked whether they had a favorable impression of each of the following, and also had the option of saying they hadn’t heard of that person or had no opinion about them.
Favorable
Heard Of, No Opinion
Never Heard Of
Unfavorable
Bernie Sanders U.S. Senator
76%6%1%17%
Joe Biden Former Vice President
74%7%1%19%
Elizabeth Warren U.S. Senator
68%11%6%15%
Kamala Harris U.S. Senator
55%15%11%19%
Beto O’Rourke Former U.S. Representative
45%20%17%18%
Cory Booker U.S. Senator
47%19%18%16%
Julian Castro Former Secretary, HUD
34%27%19%19%
Pete Buttigieg Mayor
48%18%21%13%
Andrew Yang Business Person
40%23%23%14%
Amy Klobuchar U.S. Senator
34%23%27%16%
John Delaney Former U.S. Representative
18%37%31%14%
Tim Ryan U.S. Representative
21%32%31%16%
Tulsi Gabbard U.S. Representative
21%23%33%23%
Michael Bennet U.S. Senator
20%33%35%12%
Tom Steyer Business Person
26%24%36%14%
Marianne Williamson Activist & Author
17%24%37%22%
Steve Bullock Governor
18%32%39%12%
Methodology
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Vice President Joe Biden at a campaign rally in Philadelphia on May 18, 2019. Photo: Drew Angerer/Getty Images
Inevitably, he arrives late, by SUV or van. The former vice-president is thin and, yes, he’s old. He dresses neatly and always in blue. Staff envelop him. There’s the body man, the advance man, the videographer, the photographer, the digital director, the traveling chief of staff, the traveling press secretary, the local press secretary, the adviser, the other adviser, the adviser’s adviser, the surrogate, the other surrogate, and the bodyguard.
The looming presence of the last guy, Jim, is especially important for optics. Jim is tall and official-looking. He greets the world chest-first, his hands resting in a dignified clasp, his expression even, his mouth unmoving. Most people assume that he’s a Secret Service agent. Which he was.
But ex-VPs don’t get security for life the way ex-presidents do. Most people don’t know that, not even the politically savvy types who attend these sorts of things. And that’s all for the best, because Jim — or whatever local guy they’ve got filling in for him in Iowa or New Hampshire or Nevada or wherever else — is a necessary component of the vibe they’re trying to generate here, the Big Presidential Energy, if you will, that powers this production.
And it is a production. This is true even when the event is small, which it often is, because the stakes never are — Joe Biden speaking off the cuff is something the entire campaign seems focused on preventing at all costs. Inside the community center or union hall or college auditorium, the stage is crafted just so. The red and blue letters — each roughly the size of a 9-year-old — spell IOWA 4 BIDEN. The American flag is stretched taut and stapled to the plywood. The lawn sign is stapled to the lectern. The delicate panes of teleprompter glass angle to meet his hopeful gaze, so that he may absorb the programmed speech as he peers out at his audience, which usually skews quite old and white, unless he’s in South Carolina.
This first part — the reading of the speech — he almost always gets right. Even when he makes changes, rearranging the order of the words, skipping over a few, adding others, how could he not get it right? He’s been delivering some version of it for more than 40 years and living it for longer. He could deliver it in his sleep, if he ever sleeps. It’s like my father always said: Joey, a job is about more than just a paycheck. It’s about your dignity. It’s about being able to look your child in the eye and say, “It’s gonna be okay …” There is an undercurrent of shame that pulses throughout, this idea that the unequalness of our society is embarrassing for those who have access to less, rather than embarrassing for those who have more than anyone could need.
Folks … Not a joke! He’s always saying something rather solemn, about cancer or immigration, and then adding, “Not a joke!” as if anyone thought it might be. I’m being serious here … Come on … The bottom line is … I’m not kidding around … The fact of the matter is … Barack and me … Folks … Folks … Folks … folks … folks … folks … folks … folks … folks … folks … FOLKS … folks … FoLkS … fOlKs … F. O. L. K. S. …
And this next part — the greeting of the voters — he gets right, too. In this context, he possesses an almost mystical quality that, for whatever reason, does not come across when filtered through the kaleidoscope of newsprint or television. It’s the way he focuses his eyes, which are as blue as the seas, except for (yikes) that time the left eye filled with blood on CNN a few weeks back.
He is swarmed. Women reach out to him, linking their arms in his. He bows his head and lifts their hands to his mouth for a kiss and, later, when you ask them if that makes them uncomfortable, they look at you like you have three heads. This is the best day of their lives. Are you insane? There are men, too, who embrace him, wrapping their hands around his neck. He calls every male-presenting human he encounters “man.” I watched him call a baby “man.” As in, Hey! Howareya, man?! He is as skilled a selfie-taker as any influencer, and in the span of 30 or 40 minutes, he snaps hundreds, leaning his body against the rope that separates him from the crowd, straining it one, two, three feet forward. He really does connect with every living being this way, talking about their jobs or their health care as he listens, sometimes crying with them, whispering in their ears, taking their phone numbers and promising to call them. He does, in fact, do that. Everybody is Joe Biden’s long-lost friend. Every baby is Joe Biden’s long-lost child. A little girl in Iowa City called him her uncle Joe. On the Fourth of July in the town of Independence, he took off, running through the parade like a dingo with somebody’s newborn. As hard as it might be to believe that anything in this realm could not be bullshit, it’s simply true that this isn’t.
His own loss is staggering in its scale and cruelty: Neilia, his wife, and Naomi, his infant daughter, killed in a car crash. Beau, his oldest son, who survived that crash with his brother, Hunter, killed decades later by brain cancer. And it’s as though in that loss he’s gained access to an otherwise imperceptible wavelength on which he communicates in this way, with the eyes and the hands.
“I don’t know how to describe it, but sometimes some people would walk up with a lot of emotion in their face, and without even hearing their story, he could connect with them,” John Flynn, who served as Biden’s senior adviser in the White House, said. “He would know it was either one thing or another, and he would just know how to approach them and to get them to gently open up if they wanted to. And if they didn’t want to, he just said, ‘Hey, I’m with you, and I’m there for you. I feel your pain.’ ”
Chris Coons was an intern for Biden in the Senate and is now a United States senator from Delaware himself. He told me about Loretta Wootten, a former colleague who in January went into a coma after a car crash that killed her husband. “I went to visit Loretta when she regained consciousness, and she looks at me, and she says, ‘Does Joe know I’m here?’ That’s her first sentence. I said, ‘I don’t know. I mean, he’s running for president.’ And, she says, ‘I just would love to hear from him.’ The next time I see him, I say, ‘Do you remember Loretta Wootten?’ and he smiles and he says, ‘Of course.’ I said, ‘Well, Loretta’s husband was just killed in a car accident, and she’s in recovery.’ And he gets this look, and he turned to someone and said, ‘Get me a piece of paper.’ And he writes out this page-long, heartfelt message to her, hands it to me, and says, ‘Please get this to her.’ When I delivered that to her, she wept with joy.”
I have witnessed this kind of connection at nearly all of the countless events I’ve attended in a half-dozen states in the six months since Biden announced his campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination. If he ever does sleep, surely Joe Biden dreams as he proselytizes, of an unbroken America, its ideals and reputation restored, where everybody is folks and folks have everything they need and maybe some of what they want, where the field is just even enough that nobody is ashamed of their own place on it, and where the president isn’t an idiot but where you can easily deal with the idiots by kicking the shit out of them out back in a parking lot or something. Crucially, in this dream, Joe Biden is the president.
A campaign event in New Hampshire in October. Photo: M. Scott Brauer
The pitch goes like this: Joe Biden ought to be the nominee because he’s electable, a meaningless concept if recent history is any guide, and presidential, that wonderful word — the thing Donald Trump could never be even though he literally is president — despite the fact that Biden, who appears by almost any measure to be a good man, a man whose lone sin in life is ego (and does that even count anymore?), has spent a half-century grasping for this position and watching it slip through his fingers.
To anyone paying attention — the army of political professionals more wired to observe shortcomings than are those likely to actually vote for him or for anyone else — it looks, unmistakably, like it’s happening again. His vulnerabilities are close to the surface. There’s the basic fact of his oldness and the concerns, explicit or implicit, about his ability to stay agile and alive for four more years. This was true of Biden, who is 76, even more than it was true of Bernie Sanders, who is the oldest candidate at 78, up until Sanders had a heart attack while campaigning in Nevada earlier this month. (It’s not true at all of Elizabeth Warren, who is 70 but seems a decade younger. And it’s not exactly true of Trump, who is 73 and really just seems crazy, not old.)
But it’s not just his age itself. It’s his tendency to misspeak, his inartful debating style, and — most of all — his status as a creature from another time in the Democratic Party, when the politics of race and crime and gender were unrecognizably different. It’s not just that the Joe Biden of yesteryear sometimes peeks out from behind the No. 1 Obama Stan costume. It’s that the Joe Biden of today is expected to hold his former self accountable to the new standards set by a culture that’s prepared to reject him. And though he’s the party Establishment’s obvious exemplar, he can’t seem to raise any money — spending more in the last quarter than he brought in and moving into the homestretch with less than $9 million in the bank (roughly a third of what Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders has on hand). For political reporters, marveling every day at just how well this isn’t going, watching Biden can feel like being at the rodeo. You’re there because on some level you know you might see someone get killed.
Yet Biden is still the front-runner. Volatile and potentially worthless as they may be, it’s what the polls say. Biden leads the field on average by a handful of percentage points, though his lead has trended steadily downward, from a high of 33 in May to 20 in June to 11, and then to 9.9, and 6.6, and 5.4, according to RealClearPolitics. In the whole campaign, there has only been one day — October 8 — when he slipped to second place, an average of 0.2 points behind Warren. He’s also the front-runner in South Carolina, Nevada, California, Texas, North Carolina, and Florida. “There is this sense of hanging on. And perhaps he can. But that’s generally not the way the physics of these things work,” former Obama adviser David Axelrod told me. “Generally, you’re either moving up or moving down. Warren is clearly moving up. There’s no sign that he is.”
Biden is aware that it’s not going well. But it’s not apparent that he knows how to fix it. Recently, according to his staff, his anxieties have manifested more visibly. If he begins to question something small, he spirals, eventually questioning everything. Should he be saying this in his speech? Wait, should he be giving this speech at all? Should he even be focusing on this group? Is this even the right position? He freaks out over minor stuff on the trail that staffers don’t believe he should be concerning himself with and yet is unable to make strategic adjustments. But the staff concern themselves with unimportant matters, too, running what they think is a general-election campaign when they need to be running a primary. Inside the campaign, the Biden brain trust seems to exist more to comfort the candidate than to compel him, and strategy meetings inevitably devolve into meandering, ruminative roundtables that feel purposeless except to fill time in the day. Nobody will tell the candidate in plain terms what they think he needs to change. Not that Biden really listens anyway.
Some on the campaign still believe he can win, in part because they believe he should win. But even to them, the path to a collapse seems clear: Biden loses in Iowa and New Hampshire, where his leads have been steadily declining for months and where, recently, Elizabeth Warren has overtaken him, and then, as a result, loses his sheer aura of electability, too. But inside the campaign, they reportedly see another path, though it might not seem, at first, an optimistic one: Okay, so he loses Iowa and then New Hampshire, but so what? Because he is who he is and represents what he represents — the embodiment of both the white-working-class model of the electorate and the glow of the Obama years — he can weather the losses and march to victory through Super Tuesday and beyond. “Their theory is a long, twilight struggle where they accumulate delegates everywhere as minority voters start playing a larger role,” Axelrod said. “But in reality, it’s tough to be a winner when you keep losing or at least appear to be.”
Biden would obviously like you to think about his age as experience, but another way of thinking about experience is as a record. He’s got a long one. When he was elected to the Senate, Pete Buttigieg was still a decade away from birth. There’s a lot of material, then, for Biden’s critics to work with. All sorts of stuff that doesn’t age well, or doesn’t quite compute, in this season of absolutism: Anita Hill and allegations that he violated the personal space of several women, controversy over his crusade against busing as a desegregation measure and his eagerness to work with segregationist lawmakers. Last week, after Biden attacked Trump for calling his impeachment a “lynching,” video emerged of Biden calling Bill Clinton’s impeachment the same thing. If it was relevant to American political life at any point since Richard Nixon was president, Biden probably said something about it, but it’s new to many younger voters and activists and talking heads now.
Many of them treat Biden’s talking as yet another symptom of his age, but Biden has always been like this. “His major defect is that he goes on and on and on,” Orrin Hatch told the Washington Post in 1986, when Biden was 43. To say he overcame his childhood stutter would be a bad joke, like one of those I BEAT ANOREXIA T-shirts they sell on the Jersey boardwalk in size XXXL.
In Des Moines, in August, he told a crowd, “Poor kids are just as bright and just as talented as white kids.” Realizing what he’d done, he tried to correct himself. “Wealthy kids,” he said, “black kids, Asian kids. No, I really mean it, but think how we think about it.” Two weeks later, in Keene, New Hampshire, he said, “I love this place. Look, what’s not to like about Vermont in terms of the beauty of it? And what a neat town. This is sort of a scenic, beautiful town.” (When he returned to New Hampshire the following month, a protester held a sign that read WELCOME TO VERMONT, JOE.) And so on.
Biden is cocooned by family, longtime advisers, and former White House staff. His wife Jill, Val, Mike Donilon, Ted Kaufman, Bruce Reed, Annie Tomasini, Tony Blinken, Steve Ricchetti, Ron Klain. But beyond that small circle, veterans are harder to find on his campaign. Biden is chronically slow to make decisions, and his late entry into the race, which came months after many of his competitors, was an additional challenge to staffing the campaign. Many working at Biden headquarters in Philadelphia have no experience on a presidential campaign, and some have never worked on any campaign at all; even those closest to the candidate address him, deferentially, as “sir.”
“Some of these folks who have never worked on a presidential before are like, ‘Okay, I’m working for the former vice-president!’ They don’t really feel like it’s slipping,” one senior campaign adviser told me. “There’s such reverence for getting to work for the vice-president that I think, for some of those folks, there’s a mentality of How could we possibly lose? He’s who he is. I don’t think they see that that’s not all it’s gonna take.” (Yes, even Biden’s staff say “folks” the way others say “like” or “um.”)
For many of these staffers, the campaign feels like it should be a coronation. Joe Biden 2020 isn’t a labor of love or ideology. It’s about the proper order of things. It’s about who’s entitled to what. It’s the vehicle by which the Democratic Party Establishment arrives once more to power, the displaced Obama and Clinton professionals reinstalled at the levers. If the Republic is spared in the process — which everybody genuinely wants, sure! — that’s a plus. And it’s great branding. When it comes to the enthusiasm voters wear on their sleeves for Warren or Sanders, the Biden campaign strikes a cool, dismissive pose, as if it could be believed that a candidate for president weren’t preoccupied with such metrics.
The activist wing of the party is a lost cause to Biden just as he’s a lost cause to them. When they show up at his speeches to confront him or protest in support of the Green New Deal, something I’ve witnessed twice in New Hampshire, he attempts to formulate what he surely believes is a respectful response, and yet they don’t think it’s enough, because nothing that he says could be enough because of who he is. Can you blame anyone under the age of 30 for their cynicism, for their hostility?
“Internally, there was always this idea that there would be some point when he wasn’t No. 1,” one senior campaign adviser swears. “To some extent, people were prepped for that. There isn’t a culture inside the campaign right now like, This is a done deal and we’ve lost. The culture is, This is getting real. People are still reacting to that. The question is: Does this now change our strategy and our culture? That’s where we are right now, figuring out what this new stature means.”
Where they are, if you’re keeping track, is slumped. And it’s a strange dynamic — the most qualified candidate in the race, surrounded by entitled staff who don’t understand that they have to fight for the nomination, or even the presidency, but without a real case to make beyond a Democratic succession that would amount to an Obama restoration. “He has no center,” as one person close to the Biden family put it. “He’s literally only a politician. That’s who he is. That’s all he is. Biden is fundamentally a toadie. He’s just political. He needs to kiss ass? He’ll kiss ass.”
“They have him in the candidate-protection program,” Axelrod says. “I don’t know if you can do that. I don’t know if you can get through a whole campaign that way. Either he can hack it or he can’t hack it. If you’re worried the candidate can hurt himself talking to a reporter, that’s a bad sign.” (Biden declined to be interviewed for this story.)
For his part, Biden is consumed with his endorsements, another sign of his perhaps outdated political instincts; getting insiders to declare their support meant something when powerful political machines controlled the primary process, but it has much less relevance to presidential politics today. And the only endorsement that could matter hasn’t materialized. President Barack Obama has remained silent on the 2020 primary even as he saw it fit to involve himself in Canadian affairs, endorsing Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. A senior White House official, reflecting on Biden’s weakness, told me Biden should have never even entered the race without knowing he’d have the former president’s support.
Of course, that was always less of a sure thing than it might have seemed. In 2016, Obama went all-in for Hillary, even as his vice-president contemplated a run. In the early stages of this race, he didn’t just avoid aligning himself with Biden but gestured toward other candidates, including unlikely contender Deval Patrick, the former governor of Massachusetts, possibly to discourage his former veep from running.
And then there’s Hunter Biden himself, who was going to become an issue one way or another. The 49-year-old son of privilege and tragedy, he has had struggles with addiction and run-ins with the law that have been well-documented. The campaign did its best to control the subject, cooperating with a tell-all interview over the summer in which Hunter candidly discussed his drug use and his relationship with his brother’s widow. This is sometimes how flacks think they’ll get ahead of a story: You neuter the shock value by delivering the shock yourself. But when your son is a central character in an impeachment saga likely to preoccupy all of Washington and political news for six months, it’s a hard thing to get ahead of, especially when you don’t really seem to want to engage.
“It’s sort of bewildering,” Axelrod says. “I guess I understand it from a familial, psychological sense. It would just be so much better if he stated the obvious: Even Hunter has said he exercised poor judgment. He won’t even say what his kid said. It’s an obvious question as to why the rules that he’s going to apply in the future didn’t apply in the past. All this was foreseeable … You can’t say, ‘He did nothing wrong,’ and, ‘He’ll never do it again.’ Those things don’t go together. Biden can be stubborn. I think his stubbornness is showing here.” All of that said, Axelrod added, “what Trump is doing is loathsome and outrageous because there’s no evidence that Biden did anything wrong or that Hunter did anything wrong.”
In a certain sense, impeachment creates for Biden what he wanted all along: a direct competition with Trump. Looked at it one way, it’s a story about how the president of the United States was so worried about his formidable opponent that he risked his entire presidency, and even broke the law, to try to stop him. But in other ways, it’s exactly what Biden hoped to avoid: a focus on his most troubled child, the last remaining member of his first family, and the privilege his political and celebrity status affords. Even if he didn’t do anything “wrong,” Trump is right that there’s a swamp, though he doesn’t realize he’s its ugliest creature, and impeachment is a daily reminder that Biden swims there, too. Who could withstand an entire year of character assassination by the president, who is aided by a political media that projects his every statement to the world?
Photo: Mark Peterson/Redux/Mark Peterson/Redux
At the Iowa State Fair in August, as candidates took to the stage to deliver their stump speeches and answer questions from the Des Moines Register, I stood off to the side with a few members of the press. We craned our necks downward to squint at a zoomed-in photo of the side of Joe Biden’s head. There, just behind the ear, is where you can supposedly observe the scar from a face-lift, one of many cosmetic procedures Biden is rumored to have had.
The dramatic change to Biden’s appearance is a matter of preoccupation for Biden-watchers. In the timeline of images from throughout his career, you can observe as he grows older and then younger and then older but somehow more elegant and alert. His hair is white now but thicker than it was in the 1980s. He’s thinner, but his cheeks are fuller than they were in 2008. To be honest with you, he looks good. He’s almost 77!
This is also a minor obsession of the White House, as you can probably imagine. Privately, Trump has marveled at the “work” Biden has had done and the fact that, in his opinion, he doesn’t look any better for it. Those who know him say the president is against plastic surgery (by which I assume they don’t mean breast implants) and, especially, bad plastic surgery, and he considers it an all-too-common tragedy when someone has their face inexpertly altered.
A senior White House official who regularly discusses the campaign with Trump was describing how his view of Biden has evolved since the winter. It was then, before Biden declared, that the campaign began conducting polling and sharing the results with Trump himself. The internal numbers were as bad as the external. Biden destroyed Trump. The president’s anxieties only grew as Biden became a more popular topic on cable news. “It was easy to get caught up,” this official said. “The president saw that it’s easier to picture Joe Biden up on the debate stage than some of the others.”
Over time, as Biden formally waded into the race, and the president saw the reality of the candidate as opposed to the idea of Vice-President Joe Biden, he grew less concerned, according to the senior White House official. Biden was no longer “the guy he was worried about.” And one of the reasons was, in Trumpian fashion, “his look.” Though the official adds a few more items to the list as well: “His cadence. His inability to speak. His small crowds.”
Trump has also commented on Biden’s wardrobe choices, wondering why he’d wear Ralph Lauren polo shirts on the campaign trail that show off his graying chest hair and skinny arms. (Trump himself wears polo shirts almost exclusively while golfing).
Inside the White House and the reelection campaign, the true believers know how to decode Trump’s bitchy nicknames for his competitors. As iconic as “Crooked Hillary” and “Lyin’ Ted” may be, his crowning achievement remains “Low Energy,” his characterization of Jeb Bush. “Sleepy Joe” is considered Trump’s attempt at a 2020 remake of “Low Energy,” and it’s all about emphasizing Biden’s age.
In September, somebody had the bright idea to stage an afternoon event under the open sky at the Indian Creek Nature Center in sunny Cedar Rapids. It was the day after news of the whistle-blower broke, but Biden stuck to the event’s topic, climate change, addressing all the usual themes. Then faces began turning upward to the birds overhead. Somebody from Showtime’s The Circus told me the birds were bald eagles, but at the time I thought they looked like hawks, which, I guess, is a sort of glass-half-empty or -half-full dilemma. Eventually, word of the alleged bald eagles made its way to Biden, and with a look of optimism, he turned his face to the sky. He grew emotional. He said that at the Lake House, Beau used to sit by the water and watch the bald eagles fly overhead. The night Beau died, in 2015, Biden said he watched an eagle take off from the lake, circle in the sky, and then fly away. He hadn’t seen another bald eagle since that night, he said, until now. Looking at the bird, he said, “Maybe that’s my Beau.”
Biden wrote a book about his grief, and about his son, called Promise Me, Dad. Therein, he tells a similar story, but with a different bird. That night, he wrote, “Jill spotted a white egret at the far edge of the water.” She told her husband that, as he lay dying, she whispered to Beau to go to the dock, “his happy place,” with his brother. “We watched the egret for twenty minutes, until it finally took flight,” Biden wrote. “The two of us sat in silence as the egret circled overhead repeatedly, slowly gaining altitude, until it finally headed away to the south, beneath the clouds, and gradually disappeared from sight. ‘It’s a sign from God,’ Jill said. ‘Beau being at the lake one last time, and heading for heaven.’ ”
Anne Kearns is an 84-year-old grandmother of 16 and retired professor. For 58 years, she has lived in the modest blue house with black shutters on North Washington Avenue in Scranton, Pennsylvania, where Joe Biden lived during the first decade of his life.
“He calls this ‘the Homestead,’ ” she told me last Sunday. We were sitting in the living room, surrounded by framed photos of her large family and one photo of Biden, propped up on the TV stand. For most of his career, Biden was among the least-wealthy members of Congress, an attractive bullet point that he continues to note even after amassing a fortune in his post–White House life. He often claims that “they” call him “Middle-Class Joe.” (As far as I can tell, he is the only person who calls himself this.) But he’s always had a weakness for grand old houses, even before he could really afford them, and an odd habit of referring to his properties by nicknames: North Star (for the Delaware village in which it was located), the Station (his once-bustling home in Wilmington), and the Lake House (self-explanatory). What does Anne call the Homestead in which she lives? “Well, nothing,” she said, laughing.
You could tell the story of Biden’s astonishingly long political career through Anne and through this house.
She first learned there was an interesting man who had once lived here in 1972, when she saw Biden’s ads on TV. At the time, he was running for the U.S. Senate against Cale Boggs, a powerful Republican who had won seven consecutive elections in Delaware, climbing from Congress to the governor’s mansion and ultimately to the Senate. Boggs was 63, and Biden, who at 29 wouldn’t even be eligible to serve in the office he was seeking until two weeks after Election Day, used his seniority against him. “We need some new thinking,” read one of Biden’s advertisements. “He understands what’s happening today,” read another. “My husband said to me — he watched him all the time on TV — and he’d say, ‘Ah, he’s going to be something someday,’ ” Anne said.
In 1988, when Biden was running for president the first time, reporters and authors began knocking on Anne’s door. A boy who lived down the street brought her a signed photo Biden had addressed to her, thanking her for her cooperation in this strange endeavor.
By her count, Biden himself has visited the Homestead six times over the years, once privately with his late mother, who refused to get out of the car despite Anne assuring her that the visit was not a disturbance, and other trips with the media and even Hillary Clinton.
“He came another time with Terry Moran from Nightline, and they walked across the street. At that time, I had a leg done, and so my niece was sitting where you are” — she gestured to my chair — “and she said, ‘I think that’s Joe Biden coming.’ I thought, No, he was here two weeks ago. My nephew stood up, and he said, ‘Anne, it is Joe Biden.’ They had left a message on my phone and I didn’t hear it.”
In 2008, the Obama-Biden campaign staged a formal event here with 400 people plus Secret Service sweeping through and rows of seating set up next door for reporters. Biden went upstairs to his old bedroom and signed the wall. Anne keeps photos from that day in an album underneath the television, and in them, Biden can be seen writing in black Sharpie, I AM HOME — JOE BIDEN 9 * 1 * 08. By then, Biden had served in the Senate for 25 years and run for president twice — once disastrously, ending in a plagiarism scandal, and once unremarkably, ending in a vice-presidential campaign.
The whole neighborhood, Anne said, took pride in him, supported him. Even the old lady across the street, whose sons told her she wasn’t allowed to speak to reporters or let them into the house anymore, still loves Joe Biden.
Age isn’t just a weakness for Biden. There are a lot of old people in America, and many of them really like the former vice-president. They don’t see a doddering, out-of-touch, exhausted man, as the 20- and 30- and 40-somethings who cover the campaign and dominate social media do. They look at him and see, well, a statesman from the popular recent administration who has moved to the left as the party has, if not quite as much as his younger rivals. These are the people that really vote in elections, and, to them, that all seems pretty good. “I worry when I read that he is even with somebody. I just read a piece this morning that he’s even with the Warren lady,” Anne said.
“I really think he’d be wonderful in getting us back with the people that are overseas. I think he’s wonderful dealing with people. I would definitely support him. I think he knows what’s going on with all those people … He’s a wonderful man. He really is wonderful, and he cares about people.”
A few days after I left the Homestead, Biden gave a speech at the Scranton Cultural Center. At the last minute, he decided to make an unplanned stop on North Washington Avenue. As photographers snapped away from the sidewalk, Anne answered the door. Biden wrapped her in a hug.
WASHINGTON (CNN) Former Vice President Joe Biden’s lead in the race for the Democratic nomination for president has rebounded, and now stands at its widest margin since April, according to a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS.
Biden has the support of 34% of Democratic and Democratic-leaning registered voters, his best showing in CNN polling since just after his campaign’s formal launch on April 25.
Sens. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Bernie Sanders of Vermont are about even for second, with 19% and 16%, respectively. Behind them, South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg and Sen. Kamala Harris of California each have 6% support, with Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota and former Texas Congressman Beto O’Rourke each at 3%.
Biden’s rise comes largely from a consolidation of support among his core backers, and doesn’t appear to harm any individual opponent. Warren and Sanders hold about even with their standing in the last CNN poll in September, and no other candidate has seen a shift of more than 2 points in that time.
But Biden has seen big spikes in support among moderate and conservative Democrats (43% support him now, up from 29% in the September poll), racial and ethnic minorities (from 28% among all nonwhites in September to 42% now) and older voters (up 13 points since September among those 45 and older) that outpace those among younger potential Democratic voters (up 5 points among those younger than 45).
The gains come as Biden’s time as vice president is put under the spotlight by President Donald Trump and his allies. Trump is facing an impeachment inquiry by the House of Representatives over allegations that he pressured the Ukrainian government to investigate Biden and his son, Hunter Biden, as well as the 2016 US election in return for releasing hundreds of millions in congressionally mandated defense funding meant for Ukraine. Hunter Biden was on the board of a Ukrainian natural gas company while Biden was vice president. There is no evidence that either Biden did anything wrong in Ukraine.
The poll suggests that although Biden’s October debate performance did not blow away the audience (15% who watched or followed news about it said he had done the best job in the debate, well behind Warren’s 28% — but better than most on the stage), the arguments he made on health care, foreign policy and the economy may have boosted his standing with the potential Democratic electorate.
Asked which candidate would best handle a range of top issues, Biden leads the way on four of the six issues tested in the poll. He holds a massive edge over the field on foreign policy (56% say he would handle it best, well ahead of Sanders at 13% and Warren at 11%), and tops the next closest candidate by nearly 20 points on the economy (38% Biden, 19% Sanders, 16% Warren). Biden also outpaces the rest of the field as most trusted on immigration (29% Biden, 16% each Warren and Sanders) and gun policy (27% vs. 13% Sanders and 11% Warren, with O’Rourke close at 9%).
Biden doesn’t hold a significant edge on the critical issue of health care (31% Biden, 28% Sanders, 17% Warren) but he’s surged 13 points on the issue since June, when he lagged behind Sanders. Neither Sanders’ nor Warren’s numbers on the issue have moved significantly in that time.
And Biden now runs even with Sanders at 26% as best able to handle the climate crisis. Warren is at 18% on that issue. The results mark increases for Biden and Sanders, who were each at 19% on handling the climate in June.
The former vice president’s advantages on the issues come as he emphasizes an approach that appears to align with the preferences of most potential Democratic voters. A 53% majority say they want the nominee to advocate policies that have a good chance of becoming law, even if the changes aren’t as big, vs. 42% who prefer advocating big changes even if they have less of a chance of becoming law.
Among those voters who prefer an approach that prioritizes policies with a better chance of becoming law, 38% support Biden for the Democratic nomination, 17% Warren and just 8% Sanders. On the other side, it’s nearly a three-way split, with 27% behind Biden, 24% Sanders and 21% Warren.
About 1 in 5 potential Democratic voters say they watched last week’s debate among 12 Democratic candidates, and those who watched it came away with a different assessment than those who mainly followed news about the debate. Overall, among everyone who either watched or followed news coverage on the debate, 28% say Warren had the best night, 15% Biden, 13% Sanders, 11% Buttigieg, 4% Klobuchar and 2% Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey, with the rest at 1% or less. Among those who say they watched it, though, Warren remains on top at 29%, but 21% say Buttigieg had the best night, then 13% Biden, 11% Sanders, 10% Klobuchar and 4% Booker, with everyone else at 1% or less
And those who watched the debate seem to have more favorable views of the lesser-known candidates who were seen as having good nights than do those who followed coverage. Among debate watchers, 74% have a favorable view of Buttigieg, vs. 54% among those who followed news instead. Booker’s favorability rating is 80% among those who watched, vs. 55% among those who followed coverage, and Klobuchar’s favorability stands at 56% among watchers vs. 36% among those who followed news.
Warren tops the list of candidates who potential Democratic voters say they want to hear more about: 31% name her, 24% Buttigieg, 23% Harris, 18% Booker, 17% Sanders, 16% Biden, 13% Klobuchar, 11% O’Rourke and 10% businessman Andrew Yang.
Majorities of potential Democratic voters say they would at least be satisfied with any of the top three becoming the party’s nominee, with about 4 in 10 saying they’d be enthusiastic about Biden (43%), Warren (41%) or Sanders (39%). Fewer would feel as excited should Buttigieg become the party’s nominee (27% enthusiastic).
Registered voters generally give Biden, Warren, Sanders and Buttigieg large advantages over President Donald Trump in hypothetical general election matchups. Biden leads the President by 10 points, 53% to 43%, with Sanders up 9 (52% to 43%) and Warren up 8 (52% to 44%). Buttigieg holds a 6-point edge, 50% to 44%.
The CNN Poll was conducted by SSRS from October 17 through 20 among a random national sample of 1,003 adults reached on landlines or cellphones by a live interviewer, including 424 registered voters who are Democrats or Democratic-leaning independents. Results for the full sample have a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.7 percentage points. For results among potential Democratic voters, it is plus or minus 5.8 points.
OVERVIEW The study was conducted for CNN via telephone by SSRS, an independent research company. Interviews were conducted from October 17-20, 2019 among a sample of 1,003 respondents. The landline total respondents were 352 and there were 651 cell phone respondents. The margin of sampling error for total respondents is +/- 3.7 at the 95% confidence level. The design effect is 1.47.More information about SSRS can be obtained by visiting http://www.ssrs.com. Question text noted in parentheses was rotated or randomized. Unless otherwise noted, results
beginning with the March 31-April 2, 2006 survey and ending with the April 22-25, 2017 survey are from surveys
conducted by ORC International. Results before March 31, 2006 are from surveys conducted by Gallup.
NOTE ABOUT CROSSTABS
Interviews were conducted among a representative sample of the adult population, age 18 or older, of the United
States. Members of demographic groups not shown in the published crosstabs are represented in the results for
each question in the poll. Crosstabs on the pages that follow only include results for subgroups with a minimum
n=125 unweighted cases. Results for subgroups with fewer than n=125 unweighted cases are not displayed and
instead are denoted with “SN” because samples of that size carry larger margins of sampling error and can be too
small to be projectable with confidence to their true values in the population.
1,885 of 3,769[a] pledged delegate votes needed to win the presidential nomination at the convention‘s first ballot.[1]
(2,268 of all 4,535[b] delegate votes needed to win any subsequent ballots at a contested convention)[1]
Independently of the result of primaries and caucuses, the Democratic Party will—from its group of party leaders and elected officials—also appoint 765[b] unpledged delegates (superdelegates) to participate in its national convention. In contrast to all previous election cycles, superdelegates will no longer have the right to cast decisive votes at the convention’s first ballot for the presidential nomination (limiting their voting rights to either non-decisive votes on the first ballot or decisive votes for subsequent ballots on a contested convention).[2][3][4]
The field of major Democratic presidential candidates in the 2020 election peaked at more than two dozen. As of October 24, 2019, 18 major candidates are seeking the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020. The October 15, 2019 Democratic presidential debate in Westerville, Ohio featured 12 candidates, setting a record for the highest number of candidates in one presidential debate.
After Hillary Clinton‘s loss in the previous election, many felt the Democratic Party lacked a clear leader.[5] There remained divisions in the party following the 2016 primaries which pitted Clinton against Bernie Sanders.[6][7] Between the 2016 election and the 2018 midterm elections, Senate Democrats have generally shifted to the political left in relation to college tuition, healthcare, and immigration.[8][9] The 2018 elections saw the Democratic Party regain the House of Representatives for the first time in eight years, picking up seats in both urban and suburban districts.[10][11]
The 2020 field of Democratic presidential candidates peaked at more than two dozen candidates. According to Politifact, this field is believed to be the largest field of presidential candidates for any American political party since 1972;[c] it exceeds the field of 17 major candidates that sought the Republican presidential nomination in 2016.[14] In May 2019, CBS News referred to the field of 2020 Democratic presidential candidates as “the largest and most diverse Democratic primary field in modern history”.[15] As of October 24, 2019, 18 major candidates are seeking the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020.[16] The October 15, 2019 Democratic presidential debate in Westerville, Ohio featured 12 candidates, setting a record for the highest number of candidates in one presidential debate.[17][18]
On August 25, 2018, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) members passed reforms to the Democratic Party’s primary process in order to increase participation[19] and ensure transparency.[20] State parties are encouraged to use a government-run primary whenever available and increase the accessibility of their primary through same-day or automatic registration and same-day party switching. Caucuses are required to have absentee voting, or to otherwise allow those who cannot participate in person to be included.[19]
The new reforms also regulate how the Democratic National Convention shall handle the outcome of primaries and caucuses for three potential scenarios:[2][4]
If a single candidate wins at least 2,268 pledged delegates: Superdelegates will be allowed to vote at first ballot, as their influence can not overturn the majority of pledged delegates.
If a single candidate wins 1,886–2,267 pledged delegates: Superdelegates will be barred from voting at first ballot, which solely will be decided by the will of pledged delegates.
If no candidate wins more than 1,885 pledged delegates: This will result in a contested convention, where superdelegates are barred from voting at the first formal ballot, but regain their right to vote for their preferred presidential nominee for all subsequent ballots needed until the delegates reach a majority.
The reforms mandate that superdelegates refrain from voting on the first presidential nominating ballot, unless a candidate via the outcome of primaries and caucuses already has gained enough votes (more than 50% of all delegate votes) among only the elected pledged delegates. The prohibition for superdelegates to vote at the first ballot for the last two mentioned scenarios, does not preclude superdelegates from publicly endorsing a candidate of their choosing before the convention.[4]
In a contested convention where no majority of minimum 1,886 pledged delegate votes is found for a single candidate in the first ballot, all superdelegates will then regain their right to vote on any subsequent ballot necessary in order for a presidential candidate to be nominated (raising the majority needed for such to 2,267 votes).[2][4]
More than 250 candidates who did not meet the above-referenced criteria to be deemed major candidates also filed with the Federal Election Commission to run for president in the Democratic Party primary.[27]
The following list of current candidates includes major candidates that have filed with the Federal Election Commission to run for president in the 2020 Democratic primary, have officially announced their respective candidacies, and have not withdrawn their candidacies. As of October 24, 2019, the total number of current candidates is 18.
Beside these major candidates, more than 250 other candidates who did not meet the above-referenced criteria to be deemed major candidates also filed with the Federal Election Commission to run for president in the Democratic Party primary.[65] Other notable candidates who have not suspended their respective campaigns include:
The persons listed in this section have, as of October 22, 2019, reportedly considered presidential bids within the past six months and would be major candidates.
In December 2018, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) announced the preliminary schedule for 12 official DNC-sanctioned debates, set to begin in June 2019, with six debates in 2019 and the remaining six during the first four months of 2020. Candidates are allowed to participate in forums featuring multiple other candidates as long as only one candidate appears on stage at a time; if candidates participate in any unsanctioned debate with other presidential candidates, they will lose their invitation to the next DNC-sanctioned debate.[192][193]
If any debates will be scheduled to take place with a location in the first four primary/caucus states (Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina), the DNC has decided such debates, at the earliest, will be held in 2020.[192] The DNC also announced that it would not partner with Fox News as a media sponsor for any debates.[194][195] Fox News had last held a Democratic debate in 2003.[196] All media sponsors selected to host a debate will as a new rule be required to appoint at least one female moderator for each debate, to ensure there will not be a gender skewed treatment of the candidates and debate topics.[197]
John Delaney was the first major candidate to announce his campaign, two and a half years before the 2020 Iowa caucus.
In the weeks following the election of Donald Trump in the 2016 election, media speculation regarding potential candidates for the 2020 Democratic Party presidential primaries began to circulate. As the Senate began confirmation hearings for members of the cabinet, speculation centered on the prospects of the “hell-no caucus”, six senators who went on to vote against the majority of Trump’s nominees. According to Politico, the members of the “hell-no caucus” were Cory Booker, Kamala Harris, Kirsten Gillibrand, Bernie Sanders, Jeff Merkley, and Elizabeth Warren.[218][219] Other speculation centered on then-Vice-PresidentJoe Biden making a third presidential bid following failed attempts in 1988 and 2008. Biden had previously served as U.S. senator from Delaware (1973–2009).[220]
Entrepreneur Andrew Yang was the second major Democratic candidate to announce his campaign.
In August 2018, Democratic Party officials and television networks began discussions as to the nature and scheduling of the following year’s debates and the nomination process.[223] Changes were made to the role of superdelegates, deciding to only allow them to vote on the first ballot if the nomination is uncontested.[224] The Democratic National Committee (DNC) announced the preliminary schedule for the 12 official DNC-sanctioned debates, set to begin in June 2019, with six debates in 2019 and the remaining six during the first four months of 2020.
August 8–11, August 13, and August 17, 2019: The Des Moines Register Political Soapbox was held at the Iowa State Fair, Des Moines, Iowa by the Des Moines Register.[297]
August 15: John Hickenlooper dropped out of the race, later announcing a campaign for Colorado’s Class 2United States Senate seat up for election in 2020.[298]
September 7: New Hampshire state convention: 19 candidates were in attendance and addressed the delegates.[302]
September 8: The Asian American Pacific Islanders Progressive Democratic Presidential Forum was held at Orange County, California by AAPI Victory Fund and by Asian Americans Rising.[303][304]
September 20: Bill de Blasio dropped out of the race.[103]
September 21: The Iowa People’s Presidential Forum was held in Des Moines, Iowa by Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement Action Fund and People’s Action.[308]
October
October 1: This was the deadline to qualify for the fourth Democratic debate.[309]
October 13: The New Hampshire People’s Presidential Forum was held at the University of New Hampshire in Durham, New Hampshire sponsored by Rights & Democracy, New Hampshire Youth Movement, and People’s Action.[308]
October 15: The fourth official debate took place in Otterbein University in Westerville, Ohio,[313][314] aired on CNN. The debate featured 12 candidates, setting a record for the highest number of candidates in one presidential debate.[315][316]
October 26: The People’s Presidential Forum was held in East Las Vegas Community Center, Las Vegas, Nevada by the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada Action and People’s Action.[308]
November
November 13: This is the deadline to qualify for the fifth Democratic debate.[319]
Democratic primary and caucus calendar by currently scheduled date
February
March 3 (Super Tuesday)
March 10
March 17
March 24
April 4–7
April 28
May
June
No scheduled 2020 date
The following primary and caucus dates have been scheduled by state statutes or state party decisions, but are subject to change pending legislation, state party delegate selection plans, or the decisions of state secretaries of state:[324]
The 57 states, districts, territories, or other constituencies with elections of pledged delegates to decide the Democratic presidential nominee, currently plan to hold the first major determining step for these elections via 50 primaries[l] and seven caucuses (Iowa, Nevada, Wyoming, and four territories).[324] The number of states holding caucuses decreased from 14 in the 2016 nomination process to only three in 2020.[330][331]
In addition to Milwaukee, the DNC also considered bids from three other cities: Houston, Texas;[335]Miami Beach, Florida;[336] and Denver, Colorado. Denver, though, was immediately withdrawn from consideration by representatives for the city, who cited scheduling conflicts.[337]
This is an overview of the money being raised and spent by each campaign for the entire period running from January 1, 2017 to September 30, 2019, as it was reported to the Federal Election Commission (FEC). Total raised are the sum of all individual contributions (large and small), loans from the candidate, and transfers from other campaign committees. The last column, Cash On Hand (COH), has been calculated by subtracting the “spent” amount from the “raised” amount, thereby showing the remaining cash each campaign had available for its future spending as of September 30, 2019. In total the candidates have raised $476,284,606.
Withdrawn candidate
Candidate
Campaign committee (January 1, 2017 to September 30, 2019)
^ Jump up to:abThe overall number of pledged delegates is subject to change as possible penalty/bonus delegates (awarded for each states scheduled election date and potential regional clustering) are not yet included.[1]
^ Jump up to:abThe number of extra unpledged delegates (superdelegates), who after the first ballot at a contested convention participates in any subsequently needed nominating ballots (together with the 3,769 pledged delegates), was expected to be 765 as of August 2019, but the exact number of superdelegates is still subject to change due to possible deaths, resignations, accessions, or potential election as a pledged delegete.[1]
^Prior to the electoral reforms that took effect starting with the 1972 presidential elections, the Democrats used elite-run state conventions to choose convention delegates in two-thirds of the states, and candidates for the presidential nominee could be elected at the national convention of the party without needing to participate in any prior statewide election events.[13] Twenty-nine Democratic candidates announced their presidential candidacies prior to the 1924 Democratic National Convention,[14] and a record of 58 candidates received delegate votes during the 103 nominating ballots at that 17-day-long convention. In the post-reform era, over three-quarters of the states used primary elections to choose delegates, and over 80% of convention delegates were selected in those primaries.[13] For more information, see McGovern–Fraser Commission.
^ Jump up to:abcdThis individual is not a member of the Democratic Party, but has been the subject of speculation or expressed interest in running under this party.
^Calculated by taking the difference of 100% and all other candidates combined
^270 to Win reports the date each poll was released, not the dates each poll was administered.
^Gabbard with 2.0%; Steyer with 1.0%; Bennet and Castro with 0.6%; Williamson with 0.4%; Delaney with 0.2%; Bullock, Messam and Sestak with 0.0%
^Gabbard with 1.5%; Steyer with 1.0%; Bennet and Castro with 0.7%; Ryan with 0.6%; Williamson with 0.3%; Bullock with 0.0%
^The Economist aggregates polls with a trendline regression of polls rather than a strict average of recent polls.
^Gabbard with 1.2%; Castro with 0.7%; Williamson and Steyer with 0.5%; Bennet with 0.4%; Delaney with 0.3%; Bullock with 0.2%; Messam and Sestak with 0.0%
^Gabbard with 1.6%; Steyer with 0.8%; Castro with 0.7%; Bennet with 0.6%; Williamson with 0.4%; Delaney and Ryan with 0.2%; Bullock with 0.1%; Messam and Sestak with 0.0%
^5 out of 50 primaries are not state-run but party-run. “North Dakota Firehouse caucuses” is the official name of their event, but it’s held as a party-run primary and not a caucus in 2020. Democrats Abroad likewise conduct their election as a party-run primary, with their pledged delegates allocated at later conventions solely on basis of the proportional result of their party-run primary. The last three states with party-run primaries are Alaska, Kansas and Hawaii.[329][330]
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See what Democratic candidates said about impeaching Trump
Elizabeth Warren cements status as Democratic frontrunner by being focus of rivals’ attack in 2020 debate, but it’s Bernie who gets AOC and her Squad’s coveted endorsement, as all 12 candidates unite behind impeaching Trump
A dozen Democratic candidates were in Westerville, Ohio, for the fourth primary debate Tuesday night
Senator Bernie Sanders took to the stage at Otterbein University just a few weeks after his heart attack
He reassured the crowd of his health saying: ‘I’m healthy, I’m feeling great!’
Joe Biden defended his family’s name during the debate despite scrutiny in the Ukraine scandal and his son’s international business dealings saying: ‘My son did nothing wrong. I did nothing wrong’
Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, was interviewed by ABC News Tuesday morning, where no topic was off limits
Elizabeth Warren has recently emerged as the frontrunner – surpassing Biden in several polls this month
She is facing controversy over claims she was forced from a teaching position because she was pregnant, which critics point out she contradicted in the past
Tuesday’s debate started with a united front with all candidates calling for Trump’s impeachment
In the first hour Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota delivered an impassioned attack on Trump and called out Elizabeth Warren by questioning her Medicare for All single-payer healthcare plan
In the second hour of the debate Rep. Tulsi Gabbard and Mayor Pete Buttigieg, both military veterans, went head to head over U.S. presence in the Middle East and Syria
Mayor Buttigieg and former Congressman Beto O’Rourke sparred over his proposed mandatory buy-backs of assault-style rifles
PUBLISHED: 20:10 EDT, 15 October 2019 | UPDATED: 10:18 EDT, 16 October 2019
Democratic presidential candidates who took the stage for the fourth presidential debate in Ohio called for Donald Trump’s impeachment for ‘selling out’ the American people – then blasted emerging front-runner Sen. Elizabeth Warren.
But during a prime-time event where Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders had to field questions about both his health and his age, it is the 78-year old Vermonter who got a jolt when it was revealed New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez would be endorsing his campaign at a Queens rally Saturday. Fellow squad member Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota also endorsed Sanders but it’s unclear if she will be at Saturday’s event.
Former Vice President Joe Biden, who has dominated polling for months, began the debate by defending the conduct of his son’s work in Ukraine on a day Hunter Biden fielded questions during a sit-down interview on his work for a Ukrainian energy company. He said he and his son had ‘done nothing wrong’.
During the first portion of the debate, he spoke on impeachment and his son, then remained on the sidelines for long stretches while Warren, who has jumped in national and state polls, fielded attacks from rivals.
Biden went after Warren directly later in the debate when he said his political rivals didn’t measure up to his accomplishments.
‘I’m the only one on the stage who’s gotten anything really big done,’ Biden said.
Warren countered by citing her work as an architect for what became the Consumer Financial Control Board before she got elected to the Senate. ‘I convinced people to vote for it,’ Biden responded.
Warren parried that she was ‘deeply grateful to president Obama who fought so hard to make sure that agency was passed into law’.
Tuesday’s Presidential Debate: (From left to right) Tulsi Gabbard, Tom Steyer, Cory Booker, Kamala Harris, Bernie Sanders, Joe Biden, Elizabeth Warren, Pette Buttigieg, Andrew Yang, Beto O’Rourke, Amy Klobuchar, and Julián Castro took to the debate stage Tuesday night in Westerville, Ohio hosted at Otterbein University
The calm before the storm: Tuesday’s debate started with the candidates putting on a united front in tearing into Donald Trump and backing his impeachment
Senator Kamala Harris, Senator Bernie Sanders and former Vice President Joe Biden smiled as they took the stage Tuesday night before they called for Trump’s impeachment, with Joe Biden calling him ‘the most corrupt president in all our history’
Tuesday’s debate was moderated by The New York Times national editor Marc Lacey (left), moderator and CNN anchor Anderson Cooper (center) and moderator and CNN anchor Erin Burnett (right)
Former Vice President Joe Biden listened as Senator Elizabeth Warren slammed President Donald Trump in the first hour of the fourth Democratic primary debate on Tuesday
Sanders also pushed back and Biden for his claim at the expense of the group’s accomplishments.
‘Joe, you talked about working with Republicans and getting things done. But you know what, you also got done, and I say this as a good friend – You got the disastrous war in Iraq done. You got a bankruptcy bill, which is hurting middle class families all over this country. You got trade agreements like NAFTA and (trade relations) with China done, which have cost us 4 million jobs,’ he said.
Warren spoke for nearly 23 minutes during the three-hour debate, with Biden getting the second-most time, but a full six minutes less, followed by Klobuchar.
The Massachusetts senator responded to a question from CNN after the debate about attacks from some rivals that her health plan would soak the middle class.
‘Yes your taxes will go up, but your overall costs will go down,’ she said.
Warren repeated her call to break up big tech companies like Facebook and Google – another of her proposals that brought her criticism from her rivals.
Entrepreneur Andrew Yang compared it to people to wanting to use the number four search engine. ‘There is a reason why no one is using Bing today,’ he quipped.
South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg went after former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke over his assault weapon buyback program, and said there was no time for ‘purity tests.’
O’Rourke said the nation must not ‘be limited by the polls and the consultants and the focus groups.’
That prompted Ban angry rejoinder from Buttigieg, who shot back: ‘The problem isn’t the polls. The problems is the policy. And I don’t need lessons from you on courage, political or personal.’
Others blasted Warren for the cost of her Medicare-for-all plan.
Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota told her: ‘I’m sorry Elizabeth. You are making Republican talking points in this room,’ adding: ‘We owe it to the American people to tell them where we will send the invoice.’ She told Warren, ‘The difference between a plan and a pipe dream is something that you can actually get done.’
‘I don’t understand why you believe the only way to deliver affordable coverage is to obliterate private plans,’ South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg told Warren.
California Sen. Kamala Harris pushed Harris to join her demand that Twitter suspend Donald Trump’s account due to his incendiary tweets.
‘I would urge you to join me,’ she said, saying Trump used the platform to ‘intimidate witnesses, to threaten witnesses, to obstruct justice.’
Warren shot back: ‘I don’t just want to push Trump off Twitter, I want to push him out of the White House.’
Biden beams as he takes a selfie with supporters after the fourth Democratic primary debate in Ohio last night
Biden embraces Warren as he spoke to her last night following a question about their ages (left) and Biden in discussion with Sanders during a break in the primary debate (right)
Biden takes a sip from a CNN mug last night while pointing during the fourth debate between the Democrat White House hopefuls
Senators Kamala Harris and Bernie Sanders shake hands during the debate, the elder Senator declared last night he was ‘feeling great’ in his first stage outing since suffering a heart attack
Sanders hugs billionaire activist Tom Steyer at the conclusion of the fourth U.S. Democratic presidential candidates
A record 12 Democratic 2020 candidates took to the debate stage in Ohio Tuesday night and immediately united in calling for Donald Trump – the man they all have been planning to run against – to be impeached with Joe Biden calling him ‘the most corrupt president in all our history.’
Meeting for the first time since House Speaker Nancy Pelosi proclaimed a formal impeachment inquiry, the candidates blasted Trump’s push to have Ukraine investigate the Bidens, and accused him of self-dealing and ‘selling out’ the American people.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who has jumped in the polls, fielded the first question at the fourth Democratic debate. An early caller for Trump’s impeachment, she said: ‘This president has obstructed justice and had done it repeatedly,’ Warren said.
‘Impeachment is the way that we establish that this man will not be permitted to break the law over and over without consequences,’ Warren continued.
Sanders, on stage for the first time since his heart attack, called Trump: ‘The most corrupt president in the history of this country.’
Sanders accused Trump of ‘enriching himself while using the Oval Office … in order to get dirt on a presidential candidate is beyond comprehensible.’ He called for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to ‘do the right thing and allow a free and fair trial in the Senate.’
Biden, whose son Hunter’s business in Ukraine featured in Trump’s push for a probe by the Ukrainian government, called Trump ‘the most corrupt president in modern history and I think all of our history.’
The dozen candidates met in Ohio for the first time since 10 front-runners met in Houston last month. It was the largest Democratic debate in recent memory. Others split candidates into separate pools.
The intervening period featured a dramatic move among House Democrats toward opening an impeachment inquiry of President Trump, after a whistle-blower alleged the president abused his office by pressuring the Ukrainian government to investigate the Bidens.
Billionaire Tom Steyer (left) made his debut on the debate stage Tuesday night where he slammed Donald Trump as the ‘criminal of the White House’ and South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg (right) claimed he is the Democratic nominee that will be the ‘president that can turn the page’
Sen. Amy Klobuchar went head to head with Elizabeth Warren over healthcare plans, as former housing secretary Julian Castro looked on during the presidential debate hosted at Otterbein University
Sen. Kamala Harris (left) defended women’s health and rights when she spoke at the podium Tuesday night and in a poignant moment New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker (right) warned his fellow Democratic candidates against ‘tearing each other down because we have a different plan’
Sen Klobuchar dug into Elizabeth Warren saying she hasn’t specified how she’ll finance Medicare for All single-payer health care plan under her presidency
Biden delivered yet another defense of his son, on a day when Hunter Biden told ABC he would forego foreign work if his father wins the presidency, acknowledged some responsibility for the appearance of favoritism, and admitted he got jobs due to his father’s name.
‘My son did nothing wrong. I did nothing wrong. I carried out the policy of the United States in rooting out corruption in Ukraine,’ Joe Biden said when pressed on the issue – while seeking to steer clear of details.
‘My son’s statement speaks for itself what I think is important is we focus on why it’s so important to remove this man from office,’ Biden said. ‘Rudy Giuliani, the president and his thugs, have already proven that they are in fact flat lying,’ Biden intoned, referencing Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani, who pushed Ukraine to probe the Bidens.
Biden argued the focus should be on Trump.
‘This president on three occasions, three occasions has invited foreign governments and heads of government to get engaged in trying to alter our elections. The fact is that it is outrageous. Rudy Giuliani, the president and his thugs have already proven that they, in fact, are flat lying. What we have to do now is focus on Donald Trump. He doesn’t want me to be the candidate. He is going after me because he knows if I get the nomination, I will beat him like a drum,’ he said. Trump did focus attacks on as the poll leader throughout the summer while officials were deliberating on how to push Ukraine.
His comments came after Biden adviser Anita Dunn told DailyMail.com of Hunter’s performance in an interview designed to move past the issue: ‘He answered all the questions.’
Sen. Kamala Harris of California, a former prosecutor, said Trump ‘has committed crimes in plain sight.’ She said Trump had been ‘selling out the American people.’
‘On this issue with Ukraine he’s been selling out democracy,’ Harris said, standing by her statement that she has seen enough evidence to vote to impeach.
‘I know a confession when I see it,’ she said.
New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker said he feels as much ‘outrage’ as fellow Democrats. But he cautioned: ‘This has got to be about patriotism and not partisanship.’
Speaking on impeachment, Democratic presidential hopeful Representative for Hawaii Tulsi Gabbard (left, alongside Tom Steyer) said: ‘If impeachment is driven by these hyper-partisan interests, it will only further divide an already terribly divided country’
Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, billionaire Tom Steyer and Sen. Cory Booker pictured from left to right on the debate stage
At the top of the debate the candidates squabbled over health care plans and taxes on billionaires
Businessman Andrew Yang advocated for his $1,000-a-month universal basic income policy proposal on Tuesday saying the plan would help families as he mentioned his own two sons, adding that one is autistic
No beef with billionaires: During the Tuesday debate Elizabeth Warren said ‘I don’t have beef with billionaires’ while defending taxing the rich, adding they should pitch in two cents ‘so every other kid in America has a chance to make it’
Former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julian Castro (left) blasted Trump for ‘caging kids on the border’ while he is ‘effectively letting ISIS prisoners run free’ in the Middle East and Beto O’Rourke (right) argued that the U.S. must keep Russia accountable for Putin’s corruption and dropped in a lick of Spanish saying ‘ademas’ in place of ‘furthermore’
Biden, who has taken heat for a series of verbal stumbles on the campaign trail, flubbed when he said: ‘I want to eliminate the capital gains tax – I would double the capital gains tax’ – one of his signature tax proposals on Tuesday
In one friendly moment Sen. Bernie Sanders joked ‘Are you suggesting I’m Vladimir Putin?’ to Biden and the two shared a hug
Tuesday’s debate, hosted at Otterbein University in Westerville, Ohio, saw the candidates disagree on having troops in the Middle East, healthcare, and taxing the rich
Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota delivered an impassioned attack on Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
‘He’s digging up dirt on an opponent. That’s illegal conduct,’ said Klobuchar, also a former prosecutor. ‘I’m still waiting to find out from him how making that call to the head of Ukraine and trying to get him involved in interfering in our election makes America great again.’
‘I would like to hear from him how coddling up to Vladimir Putin makes America great again. It doesn’t make America great again, it makes Russia great again,’ she said, playing off Trump’s campaign slogan.
Former Obama Housing and Urban Development secretary Julian Castro said of the impeachment effort: ‘We can walk and chew gum at the same time.’
Biden, who has taken heat for a series of verbal stumbles on the campaign trail, flubbed when he said: ‘I want to eliminate the capital gains tax – I would double the capital gains tax’ – one of his signature tax proposals.
‘The rich are not like you and me,’ said Warren, calling for her tax on multi-millionaires’ accumulated wealth.
Klobuchar didn’t denounce the idea, but said: ‘Just because we have different ideas and get to the same place in terms of beating Donald Trump and taking this on – we are in Ohio, we can win Ohio in the presidency, but only if we unite … and [not] go fighting against each other.’
But as the debate shifted quickly from impeachment to health, the united front crumbled rapidly.
Elizabeth Warren came under attack from her fellow Democrats for not being more specific about how she would pay for her universal health care plan, which some economists predict could cost in the trillions.
‘I have made clear what my principles are here. That is costs will go up for the wealthy and for big corporations and for hard working middle class families, costing will go down,’ the Massachusetts senator said of her support for Medicare for All. ‘Costs will go up for wealthy, for big corporations. They will not go up for middle class families. I will not sign a bill into law that raises their costs. Because costs are what people care about.’
In the second hour of the debate Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard and Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg, both military veterans, went head to head over U.S. presence in the Middle East and Syria. Gabbard called U.S. boots in Syria a ‘regime change war’. South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg hit back saying: ‘Respectfully, congresswoman, I think that is dead wrong. The slaughter going on in Syria is not a consequence of American presence, it a consequence of a withdrawal and a betrayal by this president of American allies and American values’
Getting heated: Buttigieg and former Congressman Beto O’Rourke also squabbled over O’Rourke’s proposed mandatory buy-backs of assault-style rifles. Buttigieg called the policy impractical and after some back and forth slammed: ‘I don’t need lessons from you on courage — political or personal’
Pete Buttigieg went on the attack against Warren, who has lead recent polls for the Democratic nomination, arguing that her universal health care plan would divide the country over health care.
‘I don’t understand why you believe the only way to deliver affordable coverage is to obliterate private plans,’ he said. ‘Our country will be polarized, more than now, after everything we have been through, after everything we are about to go through, this country will be more divide. Why divide this country over health care when there’s a better way to deliver coverage for all?’
Amy Klobuchar also struck out at Warren, saying she hasn’t said how she will pay for her plan.
‘I’m sorry Elizabeth,’ she said. ‘You are making Republican talking points in this room.’
Klobuchar went on to say: ‘Bernie is being honest. We owe it to the American people to tell them where we will send the invoice.’
Sanders had acknowledged earlier in the debate taxes will go up under his Medicare for All plan.
‘As somebody who wrote the damn bill, as I said, let’s be clear. Under the Medicare for All bill that I wrote, premiums are gone. Co-payments are gone. Deductibles are gone. All out-of-pocket expenses are gone. We’re going to do better than the Canadians do. That’s what they have managed to do. At the end of the day, the overwhelming majority of people will save money on their health care bills. I do think it is appropriate to acknowledge that taxes will go up. They will go up significantly for the wealthy and for virtually everybody, the tax increase will be substantially less than what they were paying for premiums and out of pocket expansions,’ he said.
Klobuchar, meanwhile, went in for the kill on Warren.
‘I appreciate Elizabeth’s work,’ she added but then said: ‘The difference between a plan and a pipe dream is something that you can actually get done. We can get this public option done.’
Both Klobuchar and Kamala Harris expressed frustration about how many times Democrats have argued about health care, noting they are in the fourth debate and saying the same things on the issue.
‘What bothers me about this discussion, which we had so many times, is that we don’t talk about the things that I’m hearing about from regular Americans. That’s long-term care,’ Klobuchar said. ‘We need long-term care insurance and strengthen Medicare. In Ohio that has been hit by the opioid epidemic, we need to take on the pharmaceutical companies and make them pay for the addictions they have caused in the people they have killed.’
And Harris got an extended round of applause for standing up for the abortion issue, which is of huge importance to Democratic primary voters who are worried judges appointed by Trump will revoke Roe vs. Wade.
‘This is the sixth [sic] debate we have had in this presidential cycle. Not one word with all of these discussions about health care, on women’s access to health care. It’s outrageous. There are states that have passed laws that will virtually prevent women from having access to reproductive health care. It’s not an exaggeration to say women will die because these Republican legislatures in these various states who are out of touch with America are telling women what to do with their bodies. Women are the majority of the population in this country. People need to keep their hands off of women’s bodies and let women make the decisions about their own lives,’ she said as the heavily Democratic audience cheered loudly.
When the debate turned to foreign policy, Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard faced rejoinders from Democrats when she called out both President Trump and threw out blanket attacks on those who back what she termed a ‘regime change war’ in Syria.
Tom takes on Trump: Speaking on breaking up big tech companies, billionaire Tom Steyer directed a message to Trump and said: ‘I would love to take him on as a real businessman’
Mayor Pete Buttigieg’s husband Chasten Buttigieg pictured in the audience of the fourth Democratic primary debate
Sen. Elizabeth Warren and entrepreneur Andrew Yang shared a high-five alongside Mayor Buttigieg during Tuesday’s debate
‘First of all, we’ve got to understand the reality of the situation there, which is that the slaughter of the Kurds being done by Turkey is yet another negative consequence of the regime change war we’ve been waging in Syria,’ Gabbard said. ‘Donald Trump has the blood of the Kurds on his hand, but so do many of the politicians in our country from both parties who have supported this ongoing regime change war in Syria that started in 2011,’ she continued, before blasting members of the ‘mainstream media’ who she said have been ‘cheerleading this regime change war.’
‘Just two days ago the New York Times put out an article saying that I’m a Russian asset and an Assad apologist and all these different smears. This morning a CNN commentator said on national television that I’m an asset of Russia. Completely despicable. As president I will end these regime change wars,’ she said.
Gabbard was referencing a recent Times piece that noted the lawmaker, who met with Assad in Syria and has accused fellow Democrats of ‘rigging’ the race, had injected ‘chaos’ in the race, while drawing supportive comments from former Trump strategist Steve Bannon and online approval from Russian bots.
Buttigieg took on Gabbard.
‘Well, respectfully, congresswoman, I think that is dead wrong. The slaughter going on in Syria is not a consequence of American presence, it a consequence of a withdrawal and a betrayal by this president of American allies and American values.’
Buttigieg, who like Gabbard has been deployed overseas as part of the military, said it was wrong to ‘abandon the international stage’ or ‘think our only choices are between endless war and total isolation.’
He said many U.S. troops are ‘ashamed of what their country has done’ by abandoning Kurdish allies who served as a ground force to take on ISIS in Syria and Iraq.
‘I don’t think we should have troops in the Middle East,’ said Warren. But she said the U.S. should extract its troops ‘the right way,’ then teed off on Trump, saying he has ‘sucked up to dictator,’ has ‘cut and run on our allies,’ and ‘has enriched himself at the expense of the United States of America.’
Warren tried to turn the tables on her rivals when asked about her plan to tax multimillionaires.
‘My question is not why do Bernie and I support a wealth tax. It’s why is it does everyone else on this stage think it is more important to protect billionaires than it is to invest in an entire generation of Americans?’ she asked.
‘No one is supporting billionaires,’ Biden interjected.
Buttigieg said he was ‘all for’ a wealth tax. ‘I’m all for just about everything that was just mentioned in these answers. Let me tell, though, how this looks from the industrial Midwest where I live. Washington politicians, congressmen and senators, saying all the right things, offering the most elegant policy prescriptions, and nothing changes,’ he said.
Added Warren: ‘So understand, taxing income is not going to get you where you need to be the way taxing wealth does, that the rich are not like you and me. The really, really billionaires are making their money off their accumulated wealth, and it just keeps growing. We need a wealth tax in order to make investments in the next generation.’
In the second hour Bernie Sanders reassured ‘I’m healthy, I’m feeling great’ after he suffered a heart attack several weeks ago. He thanked his Democratic rivals on stage with him ‘for their love, for their prayers, for their well wishes.’ When Cory Booker joked, ‘Senator Sanders is in favor of medical marijuana’, he joked, ‘I’m not on it tonight’
‘I’m feeling great!’ Sanders smiled as his peers including Sen. Kamala Harris and former Vice President Joe Biden applauded him after he shared his health update with the crowd
Sen. Kamala Harris and Elizabeth Warren sparred when Harris insisted on suspending Donald Trump from Twitter as Warren discussed breaking up and regulating tech giants. Warren quipped: ‘I don’t just want to push Donald Trump off Twitter. I want to push him out of the White House’
CNN anchor Erin Burnett took the debate in a fraught direction when she asked a series of candidates questions about their age and asked Biden, Warren and Sanders their views of it. Biden quipped back it made him more wise for the job
Moderators pointed out Biden, 76, would be 80 in office. He replied: ‘Look, one of the reasons I’m running is because of my age and my experience, with it comes wisdom. We need someone to take office this time around who on day one can stand on the world stage, command the respect of world leaders from Putin to our allies, and know exactly what has to be done to get this country back on track’
CNN’s Erin Burnett, Anderson Cooper and the New York Times’ Marc Lacey pictured at the moderators desk
CNN anchor Erin Burnett took the debate in a fraught direction when she asked a series of candidates questions about their age.
‘To the issue of candidates and their health: Senator Sanders, I want to start with you,’ she began.
‘I’m healthy. I’m feeling great,’ Sanders interrupted, drawing laughter from the crowd.
‘And Senator Sanders is in favor of medical marijuana. I want to make sure that’s clear as well,’ Booker jested.
‘I’m not on it tonight,’ Sanders insisted.
‘Senator, we are all very glad you’re feeling well,’ Burnett said.
Then she posed a ‘question on a lot of people’s minds … You’re 78 years old, and you just had a heart attack. How do you reassure democratic voters that you’re up to the stress of the presidency?’
‘Well, let me invite you all to a major rally we’re having in Queens, New York,’ Sanders said. ‘We’re going to have a special guest at that event, and we are going to be mounting a vigorous campaign all over this country. That is how I think I can reassure the American people.’
‘But let me take this moment, if I might, to thank so many people from all over this country, including many of my colleagues up here, for their love, for their prayers, for their well wishes,’ Sanders continued. ‘And I just want to thank you from the bottom of my heart and I’m so happy to be back here with you this evening.’ That drew sustained applause from candidates and audience members alike.
Burnett then asked Biden if he could handle the office of the presidency being inaugurated at the age of 80. She also put an age question to Warren, 71.
Any of the three of them would all be the oldest president ever inaugurated in their first term in U.S. history if elected.
The end of the debate: At the close of the heated debate Joe Biden shook hands with Pete Buttigieg
+46
Entrepreneur Andrew Yang and South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg then posed with fans following the wrap up of the debate
Say cheese: Biden snapped selfies with supporters following the fourth Democratic primary where he defended his age and boasted he’s the most qualified man for the job
Cool down: Elizabeth Warren took a swing of coconut water after the debate where she was attacked multiple times and treated like the frontrunner of the political race
Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg made sure to get a photo with Joe Biden and supporters before exiting the stage
On Tuesday it was reported that Congress ‘Squad’ member Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (left) would endorse Sen. Bernie Sander’s presidential campaign. Fellow member Ilhan Omar (right) also endorsed Sanders Tuesday night
Story 2: President Trump Calls House Speaker Pelosi A Third Rate Politician In Exchange of Words — “Goodbye, we’ll see you at the polls.” — Speaker Pelosi Stormed Out of Meeting — Democrats Lying: No Trump Meltdown — Videos
McCarthy says Pelosi stormed out of meeting with Trump over Syria
Hannity: Trump calls Pelosi a ‘third-rate politician’
Nancy Pelosi: Trump had a meltdown in meeting
Day 1,000: Nancy Pelosi Says Trump Had A ‘Meltdown’ At The White House | The 11th Hour | MSNBC
‘See you at the polls’: Trump and Pelosi have it out
PUBLISHED: 19:58 EDT, 16 October 2019 | UPDATED: 22:03 EDT, 16 October 2019
He said she’s a “third-grade” politician. She said he’s having a meltdown.
And with that President Donald Trump and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi chalked up the latest explosive meeting that ended abruptly with a walkout at the White House.
It’s a familiar ritual, with Trump and congressional leaders meeting on official business, only to see the session devolve into colorful, name-calling commentary that’s a new kind of addition to the history books. But this time, against the backdrop of the fast-moving impeachment inquiry, Pelosi arrived not just as the leader of the opposing party, but as the speaker who could determine Trump’s political future.
The administration called in congressional leadership to discuss the situation in Syria. The House had just voted, 354-60, to overwhelmingly oppose the president’s announced U.S. troop withdrawal, a rare bipartisan rebuke. Trump’s action has opened the door for a Turkish military attack on Syrian Kurds who have been aligned with the U.S. in fighting the country’s long-running war.
Trump kicked off the meeting bragging about his “nasty” letter to Turkish President Recep Erdogan, according to a Democrat familiar with the meeting who was granted anonymity to discuss it. In the letter, Trump warned the Turkish leader, with exclamation points, not to be “slaughtering” the Kurds. The person called Trump’s opening a lengthy, bombastic monologue.
Pelosi mentioned the House vote and Sen. Chuck Schumer, the Democratic leader, started to read the president a quote from former Defense Secretary James Mattis on the need to keep U.S. troops in Syria to prevent a resurgent of Islamic State fighters.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of Calif., listens while speaking with reporters after a meeting with President Donald Trump at the White House, Wednesday, Oct. 16, 2019, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
But Trump cut Schumer off, complaining that Mattis was “the world’s most overrated general. You know why? He wasn’t tough enough.” Trump went on, “I captured ISIS.”
Pelosi explained to Trump that Russia has always wanted a “foothold in the Middle East,” and now it has one with the U.S. withdrawal, according to a senior Democratic aide who was also granted anonymity.
“All roads with you lead to Putin,” the speaker said.
Then it began.
Trump said to Pelosi, “I hate ISIS more than you do.”
Pelosi responded, “You don’t know that.”
Schumer intervened at one point and said, “Is your plan to rely on the Syrians and the Turks?”
Trump replied, “Our plan is to keep the American people safe.”
Pelosi said: “That’s not a plan. That’s a goal.”
Trump turned to Pelosi and complained about former President Barack Obama’s “red line” over Syria. According to Schumer, he then called her “a third-rate politician.”
At that point, the genteel Rep. Steny Hoyer of Maryland, the House Majority Leader, interjected, “This is not useful.”
Pelosi and Hoyer stood and left the meeting. As they did, Trump said, “Goodbye, we’ll see you at the polls.”
From the White House driveway, Pelosi told reporters Trump was having some kind of “meltdown” inside. She said they had to leave because Trump was unable to grasp the reality of the situation.
Later, she would insist he even botched the insult, calling her “third-grade” rather than “third-rate.”
The impeachment inquiry never came up, she said.
Trump insisted later on Twitter that it was Pelosi who had a “total meltdown,” calling her “a very sick person!”
He also tweeted pictures from the room. “Do you think they like me?” he asked mockingly about one, showing Pelosi and Schumer looking exhausted and glum.
“Nervous Nancy’s unhinged meltdown!” he tweeted with another.
In that photo, Pelosi can be seen, surrounded by congressional leaders and military brass around a table at the White House, finger outpointed. She is standing up, literally, to Trump.
Pelosi turned the photo into the banner on her Twitter page.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of Calif., speaks with reporters after a meeting with President Donald Trump at the White House, Wednesday, Oct. 16, 2019, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
President Donald Trump speaks during a reception for Italian President Sergio Mattarella in the East Room of the White House, Wednesday, Oct. 16, 2019, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Story 1: Senator Mitch McConnell on Unfair Behind Closed Doors Single Party Impeachment Inquiry and Syria — Videos —
Senator Mitch McConnell: Democrats Are ‘Throwing Fairness And Precedent To The Wind’ | NBC News
Senate Needs to Make a Strong, Strategic Statement on Syria
Trump was ‘absolutely right’ to take troops out of Syria: Rand Paul
Democrats, Republicans unite on Trump’s decision on Syria
Senate Needs to Make a Strong, Strategic Statement on Syria
McConnell splits with Trump on Syria pullout
Mitch McConnell rebukes Donald Trump over Turkish invasion of Kurdish-held Syria, saying troop pullout gives Iran a chance to reach Israel’s doorstep and contending worthwhile intervention does NOT make the U.S. world’s policeman
McConnell once again expressed his ‘grave concern’ about the situation in Syria
Said the door is ‘wide open’ for resurgence of ISIS
Said policy could put Iran on Israel’s ‘door-step’
Said standing up for U.S. interests does not make nation the ‘evil empire’
Trump has repeatedly complained the nation should not be world’s policeman
At the same time, he blasted House Democrats on impeachment
PUBLISHED: 17:14 EDT, 15 October 2019 | UPDATED: 17:14 EDT, 15 October 2019
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell directly confronted President Trump‘s complaint that U.S. troop deployment’s make it the ‘world’s policeman’ and expressed his ‘grave concern’ about Trump’s policy moves in Syria.
McConnell issued the rebuke without directly blaming President Trump for the latest calamity in the region – although he said Trump’s policy threatens to put Iran on Israel’s door-step and fuel a ‘humanitarian catastrophe.’
Following Turkey’s incursion into Syria in territory that had been controlled by U.S.-allied members of the Kurdish minority, McConnell warned that the ‘door is wide open for resurgence of the Islamic State.’
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell took on President Trump’s contention that having forces remain in Syria was akin to being the ‘world’s policeman’
In a Senate floor speech, McConnell said the situation created a power vacuum that could fuel the meddling influence of Russia, and ‘leaving northeastern Syria wide open Iran to extend reach unimpeded all the way from tehran to the door step of our friends in Israel.
He also confronted the view, espoused directly by President Trump, that the U.S. should pull out of the region rather serving as the ‘world’s policeman.’
‘I want to make something clear, the United States has taken the fight to Syria and Afghanistan because that is where our enemies are, that’s why we’re there. Fighting terrorists, exercising leadership and troubled regions and advancing U.S. interests around the world does not make us an evil empire or the world’s policeman,’ McConnell said.
This picture taken on October 15, 2019 shows a missile fired by Turkish forces towards the Syrian town of Ras al-Ain, from the Turkish side of the border at Ceylanpinar district in Sanliurfa on the first week of Turkey’s military operation against Kurdish forces
McConnell shared his ‘grave concern’ about the situation in Syria
‘When it looked like President Trump would withdraw from Syria at beginning of the year, 70 senators joined in warning of the risk of precipitously withdrawing from Syria or Afghanistan,’ McConnell noted in his floor speech
McConnell had also warned of his ‘grave concern’ in a written statement Monday that did not mention Trump by name. But in his floor speech Tuesday, he included such a reference.
‘When it looked like President Trump would withdraw from Syria at beginning of the year, 70 senators joined in warning of the risk of precipitously withdrawing from Syria or Afghanistan,’ McConnell noted.
But even as he challenged the president on a policy that has resulted in the release of ISIS prisoners, led to attacks against key regional allies, and even led to shelling by Turkish forces toward a U.S. troop-held position, he defended the president on impeachment by attacking Democrats.
‘House Democrats are finally indulging in their impeachment obsession. Full steam ahead,’ McConnell warned. ‘I don’t think many of us were expecting to witness a clinic in terms of fairness or due process. But even by their own partisan standards, House Democrats have already found new ways to lower the bar,’ he complained.
McConnell has said he was required by Senate rules to hold a trial should the House impeach Trump.
He resorts to sanctions as the harm from withdrawal builds.
By The Editorial Board
Syrians fleeing Turskih advance arrive to the town of Tal Tamr in north Syria, Oct. 14.PHOTO: BADERKHAN AHMAD/ASSOCIATED PRESS
What a fiasco. Foreign-policy blunders often take months or years to reveal their damaging consequences, but the harm from President Trump’s abrupt withdrawal of U.S. forces from northern Syria is playing out almost in real time.
Critics said Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan would invade northern Syria despite Mr. Trump’s public warnings, and the Turkish strongman did. Critics said our Kurdish allies would strike a deal with Syria’s Bashar Assad to defend themselves, and the Kurds have. Critics said Islamic State prisoners held by the Kurds would be released and scatter to wage jihad again, and they are.
The mess compounded Monday when Mr. Trump authorized sanctions against several Turkish officials and agencies who are “contributing to Turkey’s destabilizing actions in northeast Syria.” The sanctions include financial measures and barring entry to the U.S. Mr. Trump also said he’s ending trade talks with Turkey and raising steel tariffs to 50%.
Mr. Trump now finds himself back in an economic and diplomatic brawl with Turkey that he said he wanted to avoid. Wouldn’t it have been easier simply to tell Mr. Erdogan, on that famous phone call two Sundays ago, that the U.S. wouldn’t tolerate a Turkish invasion against the Kurds and would use air power to stop it? Mr. Erdogan would have had to back down and continue negotiating a Syrian safe zone with the Kurds and the U.S.
Mr. Trump is also making matters worse with his unserious justifications. “After defeating 100% of the ISIS Caliphate, I largely moved our troops out of Syria. Let Syria and Assad protect the Kurds and fight Turkey for their own land,” he tweeted Monday. “Anyone who wants to assist Syria in protecting the Kurds is good with me, whether it is Russia, China, or Napoleon Bonaparte. I hope they all do great, we are 7,000 miles away!”
We suppose the Napoleon line was a joke, but the world is laughing at an American President. Mr. Trump was able to project an image of strength in his early days as he prosecuted the war against ISIS and used force to impose a cost on Mr. Assad for using chemical weapons. But that image has faded as he has indulged his inner Rand Paul and claims at every opportunity that the main goal of his foreign policy is to put an end to “endless wars.”
This is simple-minded isolationism, and it’s a message to the world’s rogues that a U.S. President has little interest in engaging on behalf of American allies or interests. Friends like Israel and Saudi Arabia are quietly dismayed, while Iran, Russia and Hezbollah can’t believe Mr. Trump has so glibly abandoned U.S. commitments and military partners.
By now it’s not unreasonable to conclude that Mr. Trump’s foreign policy can be distilled into two tactics—sanctions and tariffs. Mr. Trump wields them willy-nilly against friend and foe alike as substitutes for diplomacy and the credible threat of military force.
Mr. Trump won’t like to hear it, but the Syrian mess is hurting him at home too. Republicans who have stood by him through the Russia fight and more are questioning his judgment as Commander in Chief in an increasingly dangerous world. With impeachment looming, he can’t afford to alienate more friends.
Opinion: Trump’s Foreign Policy Needs to Change Course
As Turkey advances into Syria, foreign powers will increasingly act on the belief that the American executive is both politically weak and intellectually unfocused. Image: Brendan Smialowski/Getty Imageshttps://www.wsj.com/articles/trumps-syria-mess-11571095091
TRUMP’S CHAOTIC SYRIA EXIT PUTS ANTI-WAR 2020 DEMOCRATS IN A DELICATE SPOT
THE PENTAGONannounced on Monday that the U.S. was pulling all of its troops out of northeastern Syria at President Donald Trump’s direction, completing a withdrawal he had started by Twitter declaration a week earlier. The move further clears the way for a full-on invasion by Turkey, whose soldiers have already been accused of executing noncombatants. In the chaos, hundreds of Islamic State detainees have reportedly escaped.
Trump defended his decision in a series of early-morning tweets on Monday. “The same people who got us into the Middle East mess are the people who most want to stay there!” he wrote. “Never ending wars will end!”
Trump’s abandonment of eastern Syria and the U.S. military’s Kurdish allies has put progressive Democrats — many of whom also favor withdrawing from overseas military operations — in a delicate spot. Over the past week, they have been trying to thread the needle between condemning Trump for recklessly abandoning an ally and emphasizing that withdrawing U.S. troops should be an eventual policy goal.
Trump’s decision has showcased what a worst-case scenario for expedited military withdrawal could look like, making it harder for progressive Democratic presidential candidates like Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren to press their cases against “endless wars” on the campaign trail. The question of how progressives can go about drawing down U.S. military commitments without repeating Trump’s calamitous actions would be an obvious pick for Tuesday night’s Democratic debate.
So far, the Democratic candidates have been critical of Trump but light on specifics about what they would do differently. Last week, Sanders condemned Trump’s withdrawal from Syria, telling reporters that “as somebody who does not want to see American troops bogged down in countries all over the world — you don’t turn your back on allies who have fought and died alongside American troops. You just don’t do that.” But when George Stephanopoulos asked Sunday morning on ABC for Sanders to explain the difference between his and Trump’s approaches, Sanders responded simply that Trump “lies. I don’t.”
Warren’s response was similarly vague. She tweeted that “Trump recklessly betrayed our Kurdish partners” and that “we should bring our troops home, but we need to do so in a way that respects our security.”
Trump Turned His Back on Syrian Kurds. Here’s How They View Their New Precarious Position.
Ro Khanna, a Democratic representative from California and co-chair of Sanders’s 2020 campaign, told The Intercept that progressives urgently need to make the case for a “doctrine of responsible withdrawal.”
“I don’t believe that withdrawal from a progressive perspective means a moral indifference to the lives of the places that we leave,” Khanna said in a phone interview. “It’s not an ‘America First’ approach that says our interests and our American lives are the only things that have moral worth. Rather, our withdrawal is based on an understanding of the limitations of American power to shape and restructure societies. It emphasizes the need for effective diplomacy and understands our moral obligations in these places.”
The U.S. should not have withdrawn troops without negotiating a deal that would have kept Turkey from invading Syria, backed by a threat to withhold future arms sales and economic assistance, Khanna told The Intercept. “We could have used all those points of leverage to get their commitment that they wouldn’t slaughter the Kurds.”
Another key difference between Trump’s approach and that of progressives is their level of trust for civil service expertise, Khanna said. “What this shows is that it’s not enough to have a president with certain instincts. Foreign policy requires great expertise. You need a progressive president who understands the importance of military restraint, but who also has the ability to put together an extraordinary foreign policy team to implement the goals that they may have.”
Far from admiring Trump’s approach to Syria, many anti-interventionists and foreign policy experts in D.C. view it as a blueprint for how not to withdraw from a conflict, according to Adam Wunische, a researcher with the Quincy Institute, a new pro-diplomacy, noninterventionist, and nonpartisan think tank.
“What we should have been doing from the very beginning is once we achieved the limited objective of destroying ISIS territory, they should have immediately begun contemplating what kind of peace or settlement could come afterwards,” Wunische told The Intercept. “To my knowledge, the U.S. is one of the only actors that can effectively talk to both the Turks and the Kurds. So they should have been trying to find an acceptable political arrangement for all the parties involved that doesn’t involve an endless, ill-defined military presence for the U.S.”
The Quincy Institute is working on a report outlining a possible plan for U.S. military withdrawal from Afghanistan that would avoid the type of disorder on display in northeastern Syria, Wunische said, though the timing of the report remains unclear.
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Throughout the 2020 Democratic primary campaign, a number of candidates have railed against “endless wars.” But in a conversation that has been defined by intricate domestic policy proposals and detailed outlines of how to structure a wealth tax, candidates have said little about the rest of the world and even less about how they would wind down overseas conflicts.
Sanders, for example, has called for a withdrawal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan “as expeditiously as possible.” Warren has said “it’s long past time to bring our troops home, and I would begin to do so immediately.” Joe Biden has said he would bring “American combat troops in Afghanistan home during my first term,” but left the door open for a “residual U.S. military presence” that would be “focused on counterterrorism operations.” When asked during a July debate whether he would withdraw from Afghanistan during the first year of his presidency, Pete Buttigieg, the South Bend mayor and Navy Reserve veteran who spent seven months in Afghanistan, answered emphatically in the affirmative.
But aside from seeking a diplomatic solution, candidates have said very little about their policies for ending the war. And as in Syria, stakes for U.S. allies in Afghanistan are high.
A January study by the Rand Corporation found that a “precipitous U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan” would have far-reaching consequences. The legitimacy for the U.S.-backed Kabul government would plummet, the report argued, and the Taliban would extend its control and influence. People all across the country would turn to regional militias and rival warlords for basic security.
“I don’t think that anyone, whether they promise it or not, is going to get out of Afghanistan in a week,” said Wuinsche. “What we need to focus on is, what is the political solution that we think is possible, and how do we get there? That requires marshaling all of these different tools of foreign policy, not just the military.”
Kate Kizer, policy director for the D.C.-based advocacy group Win Without War, stressed that one of the most revealing differences between progressives and Trump is how they would treat a conflict’s refugees. Under Trump, the U.S. has accepted historically low numbers of refugees and closed the door on future Syrian immigrants applying for Temporary Protected Status.
“One of the cruelest parts of Trump’s policy is the fact that, in addition to fueling more bloodshed with this decision, he’s also banning any types of civilians who would be fleeing from the conflict,” Kizer said. “In a situation like Syria and even Afghanistan, there’s a way to responsibly withdraw and then there’s a way to cut and run, which is what Trump has shown he has a predilection for. But I’m not sitting here saying that any type of military withdraw will necessarily be bloodless.”
Story 2: The Search of Leakers in Trump Administration — Videos
RUST NO ONE
Trump Suspects a Spiteful John Bolton Is Behind Some of the Ukraine Leaks
Trump fears the leaks are now coming from the people he chose to serve him—and that only increases the paranoia currently infecting the West Wing.
Asawin Suebsaeng
White House Reporter
Sam Stein
Politics Editor
Photo Illustration by Lyne Lucien/The Daily Beast/Getty
At a critical juncture in his presidency, facing a rapidly unfolding impeachment inquiry by House Democrats, Donald Trump is feeling besieged by snitches.
In recent weeks, numerous leaks have appeared in the pages of The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and other major papers and news outlets detailing the president’s attempts to enlist foreign leaders to help dig up dirt on former Vice President Joe Biden and also aid Trump’s quest to discredit Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s concluded investigation. And as is his MO, the media-obsessed president has been fixated on not just the identity of the whistleblower behind the internal complaint that brought this scandal to the fore, but also on who, exactly, has been namelessly feeding intel to the press.
In the course of casual conversations with advisers and friends, President Trump has privately raised suspicions that a spiteful John Bolton, his notoriously hawkish former national security adviser, could be one of the sources behind the flood of leaks against him, three people familiar with the comments said. At one point, one of those sources recalled, Trump guessed that Bolton was behind one of the anonymous accounts that listed the former national security adviser as one of the top officials most disturbed by the Ukraine-related efforts of Trump and Rudy Giuliani, the president’s personal attorney who remains at the center of activities that spurred the impeachment inquiry.
“[Trump] was clearly implying [it, saying] something to the effect of, ‘Oh, gee, I wonder who the source on that could be,’” this source said, referring to the president’s speculation. Bolton, for his part, told The Daily Beast last month that allegations that he was a leaker in Trump’s midst are “flatly incorrect.”
The former national security adviser—who departed the administration last month on awful, mutually bitter terms—is working on a book about his time serving Trump, and has “a lot to dish,” one knowledgeable source noted.
Neither Bolton nor White House spokespeople provided comment for this story. Matt Schlapp, an influential conservative activist with close ties to the White House, said his assumption was that the leaks were coming from “career folks inside who hate Trump” and that the president and his campaign had “14 months of this” to come. As for Bolton, Schlapp said, “He’s smarter than that, although he does aggressively defend himself.”
Indeed, Bolton’s name surfaced Monday before House impeachment inquiry committees, when Hill reportedly testified that he told her to alert the chief lawyer for the National Security Council that Giuliani was working with Mick Mulvaney, the acting White House chief of staff, on an operation with legal implications, the Times reported late Monday. “I am not part of whatever drug deal Rudy and Mulvaney are cooking up,” Bolton told Hill to tell White House lawyers, according to sources familiar with the testimony.
“I have not spoken to John about [his comments, as conveyed by Hill],” Giuliani told The Daily Beast on Tuesday morning. “John is a longtime friend. I have no idea why John is doing this. My best guess is that he’s confused and bought into a false media narrative without bothering to call me about it.”
Regarding Bolton’s reported comment about Mulvaney being involved in this figurative Ukraine “drug deal,” the former New York City mayor insisted that “Mick wasn’t involved in this. I don’t recall having any lengthy conversation with him about this subject… I don’t recall ever having a lengthy conversation [about Ukraine] with John, either.”
Trump has felt under siege from within before, including at various flashpoints of his presidency. For instance, near the end of the Mueller probe, the president became so distrustful and resentful toward Don McGahn, his own White House counsel at the time, he started asking those close to him, “Is [Don] wearing a wire?”
But the current sense that he has been undermined by people whom he brought into his orbit has come at a critical juncture and colored some of the decisions he has made since the whistleblower complaint became public. The president has openly declared that the whistleblower committed an act of treason. He has attempted to stop prominent advisers—including Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland, a man who donated $1 million to the Trump inauguration—from testifying to Congress, only to apparently fail. On Monday, Fiona Hill, Trump’s former top adviser on Russia and Europe, was on Capitol Hill, where she reportedly told lawmakers that Sondland and Giuliani circumventedthe standard national-security process on high-profile Ukraine matters. The president has struggled to add to his current legal team, and appeared to begin putting some distance between himself and Giuliani last week.
And when outside allies began to talk about constructing a war room to help with impeachment, Trump shot down the concept, in part out of a sense that he couldn’t rely on them to get the message out right. One top White House aide subsequently labeled the idea an exercise by “outside peeps trying to self-aggrandize.”
The impression left on Republicans is one of a president increasingly driven by paranoia and a desire for insularity—and not, necessarily, to his own benefit.
“There is a certain level of frustration that all the sudden the president says something, then Rudy does, and it is not always consistent. There is a frustration that not everybody knows what they should be doing. It is not that they can’t defend the president it is a frustration that they don’t know exactly how they are supposed to defend the president,” said John Brabender, a longtime GOP consultant. “From the president’s perspective, this whole thing is a witch hunt and is outrageous and, therefore, it shouldn’t even need explanation…But with that said, you can’t just be angry. You need a unified communications team.”
According to those who’ve known the president, the sense that a good chunk of the government has never fully accepted his presidency and has actively worked to undermine it has animated much of his activity over the past few weeks. And though they believe he has a point, they also wonder if it is making him functionally incapable of taking the advice of some advisers: to simply ignore impeachment and apply his attention to other facets of governance.
Trump, they add, is preternaturally incapable of ignoring press about him and lingers particularly on leaks that depict atmospherics of his inner sanctum, the West Wing, and his internal well-being.
“In my experience, what he despises is somebody writing that Donald Trump feels under siege and his emotions are this and his thinking is this,” said Sam Nunberg, a former Trump campaign aide. “He hates people saying what he is thinking… And one of his most frequent tricks in terms of talking about himself on background [as an anonymous source] is him having the reporter say [he is] someone ‘familiar with the president’s thinking.’”
Nunberg said he had yet to see a blind quote in any recent report that would lead him to believe that Trump is cold-calling reporters. But the president is certainly working the fourth estate. Democratic aides were left shaking their heads last week when they received an email from the White House with the subject line, “Article from President Trump” and a PDF attachment of a Kimberly Strassel Wall Street Journal column.
“He’s apparently so anxious about GOP support in the Senate, he’s taken to sending WSJ columns against the House inquiry,” said a Senate source.
Still, for all of Trump’s grousing and preoccupation with who is and isn’t stabbing him in the back, loyalty has always been a one-way street for this president. Last week, after the news broke that Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, two Soviet-born businessmen tied to Giuliani, were arrested on charges of violating campaign-finance law, a reporter at the White House asked Trump if the former New York mayor was still his personal attorney. The president responded that he didn’t know.
Though the president would later tweet out his support for Giuliani over the weekend, Trump has a long track record for being loyal to and supportive of a longtime associate, friend, or staffer—up until the moment he’s not. Perhaps the quintessential example of this is that of one of the president’s former attorneys, Michael Cohen, who famously turned on Trump after becoming convinced that the president had abandoned him while he was in the crosshairs of federal prosecutors.
Asked by The Daily Beast last week if the president told him that he still had his lawyer’s back—an attorney who further earned the president’s trust by defending Trump during the Mueller investigation—Giuliani let out a big belly-laugh and responded, “There’s nothing, [no knife], in my back.”
“My back feels very comfortable right now,” he added.
If something is going to shake up the race before the Iowa caucuses, it’s likely to be a debate. So we partnered with Ipsos to once again track how Thursday’s debate, hosted by ABC News, affected likely primary voters’ feelings about the candidates. The FiveThirtyEight/Ipsos poll, conducted using Ipsos’s KnowledgePanel, interviewed the same group of voters twice to capture both the “before” and “after” picture of the debate.
POST-DEBATE REACTIONS
The over- (and under-) performers
How favorably all likely primary voters felt about each candidate before the debate vs. how well respondents who watched the debate thought each candidate did
To better understand which candidates did well or poorly Thursday night, we plotted how favorably respondents rated the candidates before the debate vs. how debate-watchers rated their performance. Warren was one of the better-liked candidates going into the debate, but her performance was still rated higher than we’d expect based on her favorability alone. The same was true of Booker, Buttigieg and (especially) O’Rourke. Interestingly, Klobuchar didn’t get a great debate rating, but it’s not bad considering her pre-debate favorability, which was pretty neutral. Biden and Sanders are very popular with Democrats but failed to get correspondingly high scores on their debate performance, while Castro stands out for getting the worst debate grade — even considering his relatively lukewarm favorability rating going in.
The numbers behind the chart
CANDIDATE
PRE-DEBATE FAVORABILITY
DEBATE PERFORMANCE
Elizabeth Warren
70.2%
3.3
Pete Buttigieg
65.7
3.1
Beto O’Rourke
58.9
3.1
Cory Booker
59.8
3.0
Bernie Sanders
66.3
3.0
Joe Biden
67.6
3.0
Kamala Harris
61.8
2.9
Amy Klobuchar
52.8
2.8
Andrew Yang
56.3
2.7
Julián Castro
58.0
2.5
In terms of raw debate grades — respondents graded on a four-point scale (higher scores are better) — Warren, Buttigieg and O’Rourke did best. Booker, Sanders, Biden and Harris did fine.
Who gained (and lost) support
Share of respondents who are considering voting for each candidate
The field may be shrinking, but many voters are still considering multiple candidates. Overall, we didn’t see huge shifts in the wake of the third debate, but there was some movement. Warren got the biggest increase — 2.4 percentage points — in the share of likely Democratic primary voters who are considering supporting her. Buttigieg and Klobuchar each gained a little over a point in potential support — 1.5 points for him and 1.3 points for her. Harris, meanwhile, saw the biggest drop in potential supporters, declining 2.5 points. Biden’s support barely budged; neither did O’Rourke’s, even though the former representative got positive marks for his performance.
Who voters think can beat Trump
Respondents’ estimates of the likelihood, from 0 percent (impossible) to 100 percent (certain), that each candidate would beat Trump
Joe Biden
20400%100%Absolutely certainto lose to TrumpAbsolutely certainto beat TrumpOutline showspre-debate results
Bernie Sanders
20400%100%
Elizabeth Warren
20400%100%
Kamala Harris
20400%100%
Beto O’Rourke
20400%100%
Pete Buttigieg
20400%100%
Cory Booker
20400%100%
Julián Castro
20400%100%
Amy Klobuchar
20400%100%
Andrew Yang
20400%100%
We also asked respondents to estimate each Democrat’s chances of defeating President Trump — from 0 percent to 100 percent. Polls show Democratic primary voters are prioritizing “electability,” but who do they think is electable? As you can see in the chart above, Klobuchar, who had one of the lower average scores going into the debate, saw fewer respondents say she had zero chance of defeating Trump. Buttigieg likewise had fewer people rate him as having no chance. Biden and Sanders, meanwhile, saw a small drop in the share of respondents who said they were certain those candidates would beat Trump.
Respondents’ average rating of candidates’ chances vs. Trump
CANDIDATE
PRE-DEBATE AVERAGE
POST-DEBATE AVERAGE
DIFF
Joe Biden
68.3
67.4
-0.9
Bernie Sanders
55.7
55.0
-0.7
Elizabeth Warren
51.4
53.0
+1.6
Kamala Harris
40.2
40.4
+0.2
Beto O’Rourke
33.6
34.9
+1.3
Pete Buttigieg
33.4
34.3
+0.8
Cory Booker
32.0
33.2
+1.2
Julián Castro
25.4
26.1
+0.8
Amy Klobuchar
23.3
25.3
+2.1
Andrew Yang
23.1
24.5
+1.4
There wasn’t much movement in respondents’ average estimates of how likely each candidate would be to defeat Trump in the general election. Most candidates saw their average likelihood increase, but only marginally. Klobuchar saw the largest bump, 2.1 percentage points, followed by Warren and Yang.
The popularity contest
Candidates’ favorable and unfavorable ratings among likely primary voters
Unfavorable
Favorable
Before debate
After debate
Joe Biden
69.1%
23.4%
70.7%
23.6%
Bernie Sanders
68.0%
24.0%
69.0%
24.7%
Elizabeth Warren
63.8%
15.3%
68.5%
15.6%
Kamala Harris
51.8%
20.4%
55.1%
22.6%
Pete Buttigieg
43.9%
11.7%
49.4%
13.6%
Beto O’Rourke
43.2%
19.3%
49.8%
18.6%
Cory Booker
42.7%
16.0%
48.2%
18.8%
Julián Castro
32.2%
12.4%
33.0%
23.4%
Andrew Yang
28.4%
13.6%
34.9%
20.4%
Amy Klobuchar
25.1%
17.0%
32.4%
20.6%
We asked likely Democratic primary voters how favorably they felt about each candidate both before and after the debate. As you can see, among the polling front-runners, Biden and Sanders’s favorability ratings remained relatively unchanged, while Warren’s net favorability (favorable rating minus unfavorable rating) jumped by a little over 4 points. In fact, only O’Rourke fared better than Warren; his net favorability rating increased a little over 7 points. But not all candidates made a positive impression. Castro’s net favorability, for instance, dropped by 10 points this time, after getting a big boost in the first debate.
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Trust no one? Americans lack faith in the government, the media and each other, survey finds
Alia E. Dastagir, USA TODAYPublished 11:33 a.m. ET July 23, 2019 | Updated 12:43 p.m. ET July 23, 2019
A study recently published in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health found those who showed higher signs of trust lived longer than those who didn’t. Buzz60’s Mercer Morrison has the story. Buzz60
Three-quarters of Americans believe trust in the federal government is shrinking, and more than two-thirds say the same for personal trust, according to a study released Monday by the Pew Research Center.
The survey of 10,618 U.S. adults found those who tend to be less trustful in their personal lives also tend to be less trustful of institutions, which includes elected officials, the military, religious leaders and the media.
“Many people no longer think the federal government can actually be a force for good or change in their lives. This kind of apathy and disengagement will lead to an even worse and less representative government,” one survey respondent said.
Despite the current outlook, Americans are hopeful declining trust is a solvable problem. The survey found 84% believe confidence in the federal government can be improved, and 86% think the same of confidence in one another.
Other key findings:
69% say the federal government withholds important information from the public
61% say the news media ignores important stories
58% of adults are not confident people can hold civil conversations with those who have different views
57% are not confident people will cast informed votes in elections
Young adults are about half as hopeful as older Americans when asked how confident they are that Americans respect the rights of those who are not like them
The share of whites who show high levels of trust (27%) is twice as high as the share of blacks (13%) and Hispanics (12%).
Democrats are more likely than Republicans to say trust in the federal government is shrinking (82% vs. 66%) and that makes it harder to solve many of the country’s problems (70% vs. 57%).
But there is one thing Americans agree on regardless of politics: Trust in both the federal government and in one another must improve. Among the solutions respondents provided: less political partisanship, tribalism and sensationalist stories, and more empathy all around.
One survey respondent, a 63-year-old woman, suggested five things that would make it better:
“1. If members of each party would be less concerned about their power and the next election and more concerned with how they can serve their people. Term limits a possibility.
2. Rules about lobbyists/corporate money influencing politicians.
3. Importance of ethics laws and follow through for violators.
4. Promoting fact-based legislation. 5. Better relations among both parties and leaders; this is not a war.”
Most Americans say they have lost trust in the media
THE RESULTS OF A NEW Knight Foundation and Gallup poll released on Tuesday won’t come as a huge surprise to most journalists: Trust in the media is down. Again.
A majority of those who were surveyed said they had lost trust in the media in recent years, and more than 30 percent of those who identified themselves as being on the conservative end of the spectrum said they had not only lost faith in the media, but they “expect that change to be permanent.” According to a separate Gallup poll from earlier this year that tracked trust in major institutions, newspapers and television news were among the lowest, exceeded only by Congress.
Is this decline in trust related to the repeated attacks on “the lying media” by President Trump and his supporters, who like to describe the press as “the enemy of the people?” That kind of analysis is beyond the scope of the latest Knight/Gallup study, but it has to be part of the backdrop. Respondents who said they paid the least amount of attention to the news were among those who mistrusted the media the most—is that because all they hear about the media is that it makes things up and is out to get the president?
When people were asked why they don’t trust the media, about 45 percent referred to things like inaccuracy, bias, “fake news,” and “alternative facts,” the latter two being common descriptions given by Donald Trump and members of his administration. A general lack of credibility and the fact that reports are “based on opinions or emotions” are two of the other reasons given for a loss of trust. About 10 percent of those surveyed also mentioned sensationalism, “clickbait,” or hype as a negative factor. Interestingly, twice as many young adults (18 to 34) as older respondents said politically focused coverage or partisan bias was a factor in their lack of trust.
The study did try to come up with a few rays of light. For example, the survey asked people whether they thought their trust in media might be restored somehow, and almost 70 percent of them said yes—60 percent of those who identified themselves as Republicans and 86 percent of those who said they were Democrats. And what might restore that lost trust? Respondents chose a variety of factors such as accuracy (including “not reporting stories before [a news outlet] verifies all the facts and being willing to correct mistakes it makes”), as well as lack of bias, and transparency (including “providing fact-checking resources and providing links to research and facts that back up [the news outlet’s] reporting”).
As the study’s authors admit, however, these proposed solutions aren’t as straightforward as they might appear. Whether a news outlet is being accurate when reporting the facts of a story, for example, is something different readers are going to come to different conclusions on, depending in some cases on their political views. If an outlet reports that Donald Trump is under suspicion for influence peddling with the Russians, to take just one hypothetical example, those who are inclined to believe this may see it as accurate, while those who vehemently disagree will see it as inaccurate and therefore untrustworthy. Trust, as an earlier Knight/Gallup poll suggests, is a slippery topic when it comes to the media.Here are some more links about the complex relationship between trust and the media:
The rebound effect: Both Twitter and Facebook have talked about trying to expose users to a broader range of views to burst their filter bubbles, but a sociologist writing in The New York Times says his research shows that doing this causes people to become more entrenched in their views, not less.
What about trust ratings? Another experiment by Knight and Gallup using the same testing platform looked at whether crowdsourced ratings of trust or accuracy changed people’s expectations about a news article, and it turns out they do—stories that have trust ratings are actually trusted less than those that don’t.
A culture of listening: The American Press Institute recently held a symposium on ways that media organizations can help to build or regain the trust of their readers, and those who participated came up with a number of recommendations, including talking with “ex-fans” to see why they left, and also not being an “ask-hole.”
Optimizing for trust: New York University journalism professor Jay Rosen has written about what it means when a media outlet “optimizes for trust,” a recipe that includes transparency about potential conflicts, a commitment to accuracy, and a view of readers that sees them more as contributors rather than just consumers of content.
Other notable stories:
Brazilian fact-checkers working with Facebook to flag fake news stories in the run-up to elections in that country next month say they have been harassed and even subjected to death threats for their work, according to a report from Poynter.
Cory Doctorow writes about why European authors, journalists, and publishers need to fight the European Union’s newly proposed copyright laws, which could forceonline services and publishers to remove content if it matches an index of copyrighted works, and could also impose a tax for linking to external articles.
Bryan Goldberg, the founder and CEO of Bustle, plans to re-launch Gawker, the flagship site of the former Gawker Media, which filed for bankruptcy after a lawsuit launched by former wrestler Hulk Hogan. Goldberg acquired the domain name and archives of Gawker for $1.3 million in an auction in July.
Facebook is testing a new feature in its CrowdTangle service for journalists that would allow them to flag a news story as inaccurate from inside the service. CrowdTangle, which Facebook acquired in 2016, allows journalists and other users of the tool to see what stories, photos and videos are trending on the network.
Twitter and Facebook may get most of the attention when it comes to news, but a Pew Research Center study seems to show that Reddit is the most news-centric social service of them all. According to the survey, 73 percent of Reddit users say they get their news there, compared with 71 percent for Twitter and 67 percent for Facebook.
Nick Diakopoulos writes for CJR about an emerging category of social-media “bots” or automated accounts that actually help rather than cause harm, by aggregating or distributing information that has public value, including automated accounts that track changes in New York Times articles or Wikipedia entries.
Left-leaning news site ThinkProgress has complained that one of its articles was improperly flagged as inaccurate by The Weekly Standard, a conservative site that is a member of Facebook’s fact-checking program. Alexios Mantzarlis, who runs the International Fact-Checking Network, wrote on Twitter about some of the problems raised by the case, which he says were exacerbated by the post’s headline.
Trust and Mistrust in Americans’ Views of Scientific Experts
More Americans have confidence in scientists, but there are political divides over the role of scientific experts in policy issues
In an era when science and politics often appear to collide, public confidence in scientists is on the upswing, and six-in-ten Americans say scientists should play an active role in policy debates about scientific issues, according to a new Pew Research Center survey.
The survey finds public confidence in scientists on par with confidence in the military. It also exceeds the levels of public confidence in other groups and institutions, including the media, business leaders and elected officials.
At the same time, Americans are divided along party lines in terms of how they view the value and objectivity of scientists and their ability to act in the public interest. And, while political divides do not carry over to views of all scientists and scientific issues, there are particularly sizable gaps between Democrats and Republicans when it comes to trust in scientists whose work is related to the environment.
Higher levels of familiarity with the work of scientists are associated with more positive and more trusting views of scientists regarding their competence, credibility and commitment to the public, the survey shows.
Overall, 86% of Americans say they have at least “a fair amount” of confidence in scientists to act in the public interest. This includes 35% who have “a great deal” of confidence, up from 21% in 2016.
But a partisan divide persists. More Democrats (43%) than Republicans (27%) have “a great deal” of confidence in scientists – a difference of 16 percentage points. The gap between the two parties on this issue (including independents who identify with each party, respectively) was 11 percentage points in 2016 and has remained at least that large since.
There are also clear political divisions over the role of scientific experts in policy matters, with Democrats more likely to want experts involved and to trust their judgment. Most Democrats (73%) believe scientists should take an active role in scientific policy debates. By contrast, a majority of Republicans (56%) say scientists should focus on establishing sound scientific facts and stay out of such policy debates. The two political groups also differ over whether scientific experts are generally better at making decisions about scientific policy issues than other people: 54% of Democrats say they are, while 66% of Republicans think scientists’ decisions are no different from or worse than other people’s. Finally, Democrats and Republicans have different degrees of faith in scientists’ ability to be unbiased; 62% of Democrats say scientists’ judgments are based solely on facts, while 55% of Republicans say scientists’ judgments are just as likely to be biased as other people’s.
The Center’s new survey highlights the degree to which the public values scientific expertise and how those perceptions are sometimes shaped by the crosscurrents of politics as well as familiarity with scientists and their work. More specifically, it shines a spotlight on trust and potential sources of mistrust connected with scientists who work in three fields: medicine, nutrition and the environment. They include medical research scientists, medical doctors, nutrition research scientists, dietitians, environmental research scientists and environmental health specialists.
The survey of 4,464 adults was conducted in January 2019 using Pew Research Center’s American Trends Panel, a nationally repr
esentative panel of randomly selected U.S. adults.
The survey probed for people’s trust in scientists, along with potential sources of mistrust. To capture trust, the survey asked respondents how often they can count on scientists to perform their jobs with competence, to show care or concern for the public and to present their findings or recommendations in a fair and accurate way. The survey also asked for views about scientific integrity, including the extent to which misconduct is a problem, the degree to which scientists are open about potential conflicts of interest, and whether they accept accountability for mistakes.
Among other important findings:
Despite generally positive views about scientists across all six specialties, most Americans are skeptical about key areas of scientific integrity. No more than two-in-ten Americans believe scientists across these groups are transparent about potential conflicts of interest with industry all or most of the time. Similarly, minorities (ranging from 11% to 18%) say scientists regularly admit their mistakes and take responsibility for them. Between about a quarter and half of Americans consider misconduct a “very big” or “moderately big” problem, with the public generally skeptical that those engaged in misconduct routinely face serious consequences.
Americans tend to trust science practitioners, who directly provide treatments and recommendations to the public, more than researchers working in the same areas. For example, 47% say dietitians provide fair and accurate information about their recommendations all or most of the time, compared with 24% for nutrition scientists discussing their research. There is a similar gap when it comes to information from medical doctors and medical research scientists (48% and 32%, respectively, say they provide fair and accurate information all or most of the time). However, trust in environmental health specialists – practitioners who offer recommendations to organizations and community groups – is about the same as that for environmental research scientists.
When Americans gauge the kinds of things that would influence their faith in scientific findings, their verdict is clear: Open public access to data and independent committee reviews inspire the most confidence in scientists and boost their trust in research findings.
A majority of U.S. adults (54%, including equal shares of Democrats and Republicans) believe the public should play an important role in guiding policy decisions on scientific issues; 44% say public opinion should not play an important role because the issues are too complex for the average person to understand.
Public confidence in medical scientists is similar to that for scientists overall; 87% report either a great deal (35%) or a fair amount (52%) of confidence in medical scientists to act in the best interests of the public.
Americans with more factual science knowledge have greater confidence than those with less science knowledge that scientists act in the public interest. (For more information about the science knowledge index, see “What Americans Know About Science.”)
Black and Hispanic adults are more likely than whites to see professional or research misconduct as a very or moderately big problem. For doctors, for example, 71% of blacks and 63% of Hispanics say misconduct is at least a moderately big problem, compared with 43% of whites. A larger percentage of blacks (59%) and Hispanics (60%) than whites (42%) say misconduct by medical research scientists is a very big or moderately big problem.
1. Partisanship influences views on the role and value of scientific experts in policy debates
A majority of U.S. adults support the participation of scientific experts in policy debates, but Democrats are more likely than Republicans to think scientists should be involved and are more likely to value their decisions. Partisan divisions also arise in beliefs about the value of the scientific method and the likelihood of bias in scientists’ judgments.
Overall, 60% of Americans say scientists should play an active role in policy debates about scientific issues, the Center’s new survey shows. A smaller share (39%) says scientists should “focus on establishing sound scientific facts and stay out of public policy debates.”
But there are dueling perspectives along party lines about the role and value of scientific experts in science-related policy debates, with most Democrats (73%, including leaners) saying scientists should take an active role. In contrast, a majority of Republicans (56%, including leaners) say scientists should focus on their research and stay out of policy debates, while a smaller percentage (43%) say scientists should play an active role in such debates.
Democrats also are more inclined than Republicans to value the opinions of scientific experts in policy matters. Some 54% of Democrats think scientific experts are usually better at making decisions about scientific issues than other people. In contrast, 34% of Republicans say the same.
How much people know about science can also impact their perspectives on these topics, but the findings show the influence of people’s science knowledge on their views depends on their partisan lens. For example, 84% of Democrats with high science knowledge say scientists should play an active role in science policy debates, compared with 58% of Democrats with low science knowledge. No such pattern exists among Republicans. Four-in-ten Republicans with high science knowledge (40%) – and 52% of those with low science knowledge – say scientists should play an active role in science policy debates. Past Pew Research Center surveys have found a similar pattern on a range of views related to climate and energy issues.
More Democrats than Republicans trust the objectivity of scientists and the scientific method
Most Americans believe the processes of science – namely, the scientific method of observing and collecting empirical evidence – are fundamentally sound.
Overall, 63% of Americans say the scientific method generally produces accurate conclusions, while a smaller share (35%) says it can be manipulated to produce a desired conclusion.
Further, a majority of U.S. adults (55%) believe scientists’ judgments are “based solely on the facts,” as opposed to scientists being “just as likely to be biased” in their judgments as other people (44%).
On average, however, more Democrats than Republicans (including independents who identify with each party) are inclined to express confidence in both the scientific method and scientists’ conclusions.
Seven-in-ten Democrats (70%) say the scientific method generally produces accurate conclusions. Opinion among Republicans is more divided, with 55% saying the scientific method produces accurate conclusions and 44% saying the scientific method can be manipulated by researchers to produce desired results.
About six-in-ten Democrats (62%) say scientists make judgments based solely on the facts. By comparison, 44% of Republicans say scientists’ judgments are based on facts, while 55% say scientists’ opinions are just as likely to be biased as other people’s.
Science knowledge levels also influence people’s views on these issues, but the correlation depends on their partisanship.
Among Democrats, an overwhelming majority of those with high science knowledge (86%) think the scientific method generally produces accurate conclusions. In contrast, about half of Democrats with low science knowledge (52%) say the scientific method produces accurate conclusions. Differences are modest by comparison among Republicans with high, medium and low science knowledge levels.
But when it comes to questions of susceptibility to bias, 64% of Republicans with high science knowledge say scientists are just as likely to be biased as other people, while 42% of Republicans with low science knowledge agree. Democrats with low, medium and high science knowledge are all about equally likely (in the 34% to 39% range) to view scientists as susceptible to bias.
Thus, knowledge and information can influence beliefs about these matters, but it does so through the lens of partisanship, a tendency known as motivated reasoning.
Public trust in scientists is only sometimes correlated with political party
Despite political differences over the role and value of scientific experts, public support for and trust in scientists is not uniformly connected with politics, but rather differs depending on the field of scientific study. The Center’s survey looks at public trust in scientists specializing in the environment, medicine and nutrition. Democrats have more trust than Republicans in environmental scientists – whether researchers or environmental health specialists – to perform their jobs with competence, to show concern for the public interest and to present their findings or recommendations in a fair and accurate way. There are also some partisan differences in views of nutrition researchers, but there are no such differences when it comes to medical doctors, medical researchers or dietitians. For details, see “Partisan differences in overall views of and trust in scientists occur primarily for environmental scientists.”
Prior Pew Research Center studies have shown wide political divides on public attitudes related to climate, energy and the environment but no differences or only modest ones when it comes to a host of other science-related issues, including beliefs about the safety of childhood vaccines and the health risks of eating genetically modified foods.
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Candidates will need to have 130,000 unique donors and register at least 2 percent support in four polls. They have until Aug. 28 to reach those benchmarks.
These criteria could easily halve the field: The first two sets of debates included 20 of the 24 candidates, but a New York Times analysis of polls and donor numbers shows that only 10 to 12 candidates are likely to make the third round.
Seven candidates have already met both qualification thresholds and are guaranteed a spot on stage. They are:
■ Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.
■ Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey
■ Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Ind.
■ Senator Kamala Harris of California
■ Former Representative Beto O’Rourke of Texas
■ Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont
■ Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts
Three other candidates are very close: The former housing secretary Julián Castro and the entrepreneur Andrew Yang have surpassed 130,000 donations and each have three of the four qualifying polls they need, while Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota has met the polling threshold and has about 120,000 donors.
Beyond them, only three candidates have even a single qualifying poll to their name: the impeachment activist Tom Steyer (2 polls), Representative Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii (1) and former Gov. John Hickenlooper of Colorado (1).
We asked all three of their campaigns to provide donor numbers so we could assess where they stood. Ms. Gabbard had just under 114,000 donors as of Wednesday night. A spokesman for Mr. Steyer said he was “on track to collect the required number of donors to make the September debate stage” but did not give a number. Mr. Hickenlooper’s campaign did not respond, but Politico reported a month ago that he had only 13,000 donors.
The other 11 candidates in the race have no qualifying polls to their name, and they all went into this week’s debates seeking a viral moment that would attract new donors and lift them, even briefly, in the polls.
The qualification rules do not require enduring support. Even a small post-debate surge could push a 1 percent candidate up to 2 percent in the small handful of polls he or she needs.
But for those who have not qualified, the Aug. 28 deadline is an existential threat. Candidates like Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York or Gov. Jay Inslee of Washington could be washed out of the race if they don’t get momentum from this week’s debates. And if you’re wondering whether they’re anxious, the answer is yes.
Ms. Gabbard’s campaign calculated at one point that she needed a new donor every minute to reach 130,000 by the Aug. 28 deadline, so if you go to her website, a timer next to the donation button begins counting down 60 seconds. Then the text changes.
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Donald Trump unleashed on the Federal Reserve Wednesday afternoon after it made its first interest rate cut in more than a decade saying it was not ‘much help’ after the bank’s chairman signaled the move was a one-off reduction.
Jerome Powell sent share prices plunging as he called the 0.25 per cent cut in the key interest rate a ‘mid-cycle adjustment’ and talked down the chances of more cuts following.
The Dow Jones fell by 400 points as Powell signaled at a press conference in Washington D.C. that the cut was a one-off.
The Dow closed down 333 points and both the NASDAQ and S&P 500 lost 1% of their value.
Donald Trump unleashed on the Federal Reserve Wednesday afternoon after it made its first interest rate cut in more than a decade saying it was not ‘much help’ after the bank’s chairman signaled the move was a one-off reduction.
Jerome Powell sent share prices plunging as he called the 0.25 per cent cut in the key interest rate a ‘mid-cycle adjustment’ and talked down the chances of more cuts following.
The Dow Jones fell by 400 points as Powell signaled at a press conference in Washington D.C. that the cut was a one-off.
The Dow closed down 333 points and both the NASDAQ and S&P 500 lost 1% of their value.
Donald Trump unleashed on the Federal Reserve Wednesday afternoon after it made its first interest rate cut in more than a decade saying it was not ‘much help’ after the bank’s chairman signaled the move was a one-off reduction.
Jerome Powell sent share prices plunging as he called the 0.25 per cent cut in the key interest rate a ‘mid-cycle adjustment’ and talked down the chances of more cuts following.
The Dow Jones fell by 400 points as Powell signaled at a press conference in Washington D.C. that the cut was a one-off.
The Dow closed down 333 points and both the NASDAQ and S&P 500 lost 1% of their value.
Trump used the market fall to make his case that Powell and his board should have started an ‘agressive’ series of rate cuts.
‘What the Market wanted to hear from Jay Powell and the Federal Reserve was that this was the beginning of a lengthy and aggressive rate-cutting cycle which would keep pace with China, The European Union and other countries around the world.
‘As usual, Powell let us down, but at least he is ending quantitative tightening, which shouldn’t have started in the first place – no inflation. We are winning anyway, but I am certainly not getting much help from the Federal Reserve!’
Trump had gone all-in on a call for a 0.5 per cent reduction to stimulate the U.S. economy. ‘The Fed has made all of the wrong moves. A small rate cut is not enough, but we will win anyway!’ he had tweeted on Monday.
Explanation time: Jerome Powell, the chairman of the Federal Reserve, outlined why it had cut interest rates – as the markets reacted in real time with a sell-off which reached as much as 400 points wiped off the Dow in the course of his press conference
How markets reacted: The Dow Jones closed 333 points down in a sign of concern that the rate cut was effectively a one-off – not the stimulus Trump has demanded
President Donald Trump had all but demanded a rate-slashing, but predicted that the Fed wouldn’t do ‘enough’ to stimulate the U.S. economy. He had heaped pressure on Jerome Powell, his own appointment as chairman, to cut the cost of borrowing.
Powell and the reserve, however, defied him.
It voted that the new benchmark interest rate will fall between 2 per cent and 2.25 per cent. The Fed’s board had voted nine times since 2015 to increase it.
Eight of the Fed’s 10 board members voted to trim the short-term benchmark rate. The other two argued for leaving it as-is.
Powell, speaking in a news conference after the release of the Fed statement, characterized the rate cut as ‘a mid-cycle adjustment to policy,’ comments that do not imply sharp further cuts are on the way.
Among his messages at the press conference in Washington D.C. were that job growth was slowing and that trade tensions were bad for the economy’s outlook – but he repeatedly talked up the strength of the economy.
Explaining the cut, Powell cited global weakness and a desire to boost too-low inflation in explaining the central bank’s decision to lower borrowing costs for the first time since 2008 and move up plans to stop winnowing its massive bond holdings.
Financial markets had widely expected the Fed to reduce its key overnight lending rate by a quarter of a percentage point to a target range of 2.00% to 2.25%, but many traders expected a clearer confirmation of forthcoming rate cuts.
Instead Powell’s message was taken to mean that rates will stay where they are, prompting shares to fall.
And the value of the dollar up against other currencies, which will further anger Trump who had wanted it to fall to boost exports.
The rate cut means that consumers will find in the coming months that interest rates will fall for long-term fixed mortgages, auto loans and credit cards.
That can mean significant household savings, which Americans typically pour back into the U.S. economy through higher spending.
For those few who save their winnings in the periodic Fed lottery, however, interest rates for bank savings accounts will also likely fall.
Mortgage rates were already sliding downward before the Fed met, due to other economic factors.
Even with Wednesday’s cut, the Fed’s principal interest rate is the highest in years. But by historical standards it’s still low.
A policy statement appeared to leave the door open for the Fed to cut rates again in September as it ‘contemplates the future path of the target range for the federal funds rate.’
‘In light of the implications of global developments for the economic outlook as well as muted inflation pressures, the committee decided to lower the target range for the federal funds rate,’ the U.S. central bank said.
But Powell’s lengthy press conference appeared to close the door on that.
Wednesday’s cut is seen as an early bid to prevent a downturn in the U.S. economy that forecasters say will result from Trump’s trade war with China.
Economic indicators: Interest rates remain at historically low levels, while unemployment is at the lowest point since Nixon was president.
Uncertainties in global markets have paralyzed some businesses, starting what could soon be a global slowdown.
The Fed’s statement said that the U.S. labor market ‘remains strong,’ and that the domestic economy is continuing to grow ‘at a moderate rate.’ Overall inflation is running below 2 per cent.
Trump griped on July 22 that the federal funds rate, which determines how much banks – and, by extension, consumers – pay to borrow money, continued to be too high.
‘With almost no inflation, our Country is needlessly being forced to pay a MUCH higher interest rate than other countries only because of a very misguided Federal Reserve,’ he wrote then in a tweet.
On Monday he added that the Fed had previously hiked rates ‘way too early and way too much.’
Trump believes that other countries are more adept at managing the money supplies that move in and out of their financial systems, and in keeping the interest rates that drive borrowing and bond trading flexible.
He has grown increasingly impatient with Fed chairman Jerome Powell, who he believes he can replace at will.
‘I have the right to demote him. I have the right to fire him,’ the president said last month, cautioning that he had ‘never suggested’ doing so.
Any move to oust Powell would likely touch off a legal fight with major repercussions in financial markets as greater uncertainties spook traders.
U.S. economic data continues to be mixed, despite Trump’s frequent claims that he presides over a miraculous resurgence.
The unemployment rate is nearing a low point not seen in America since Richard Nixon was president and stock markets have hit repeated new records
Markets watching: Traders had largely expected a reduction in the key interest rate by the Federal Reserve; the Dow was down slightly immediately after it was announced
But the nation’s manufacturing economy, which Trump promised to revitalize, has stalled in the past two quarters, and the growth of America’s economy is growing at 2.1 per cent per year – slower than the president has predicted.
The move is seen as an early bid to prevent a downturn in the U.S. economy that forecasters say will result from Trump’s trade war with China.
Uncertainties in global markets have paralyzed some businesses, starting what could soon be a global slowdown.
The Fed’s statement said that the U.S. labor market ‘remains strong,’ and that the domestic economy is continuing to grow ‘at a moderate rate.’ Overall inflation is running below 2 per cent.
Trump griped on July 22 that the federal funds rate, which determines how much banks – and, by extension, consumers – pay to borrow money, continued to be too high.
‘With almost no inflation, our Country is needlessly being forced to pay a MUCH higher interest rate than other countries only because of a very misguided Federal Reserve,’ he wrote then in a tweet.
On Monday he added that the Fed had previously hiked rates ‘way too early and way too much.’
Trump believes that other countries are more adept at managing the money supplies that move in and out of their financial systems, and in keeping the interest rates that drive borrowing and bond trading flexible.
He has grown increasingly impatient with Fed chairman Powell, who he believes he can replace at will.
‘I have the right to demote him. I have the right to fire him,’ the president said last month, cautioning that he had ‘never suggested’ doing so.
Any move to oust Powell would likely touch off a legal fight with major repercussions in financial markets as greater uncertainties spook traders.
WHY WE CUT INTEREST RATES FOR FIRST TIME IN A DECADE: WHAT THE FED SAID IN FULL TO EXPLAIN ITS MOVE
Information received since the Federal Open Market Committee met in June indicates that the labor market remains strong and that economic activity has been rising at a moderate rate.
Job gains have been solid, on average, in recent months, and the unemployment rate has remained low.
Although growth of household spending has picked up from earlier in the year, growth of business fixed investment has been soft.
On a 12-month basis, overall inflation and inflation for items other than food and energy are running below 2 percent.
Market-based measures of inflation compensation remain low; survey-based measures of longer-term inflation expectations are little changed.
Consistent with its statutory mandate, the Committee seeks to foster maximum employment and price stability.
In light of the implications of global developments for the economic outlook as well as muted inflation pressures, the Committee decided to lower the target range for the federal funds rate to 2 to 2-1/4 percent.
This action supports the Committee’s view that sustained expansion of economic activity, strong labor market conditions, and inflation near the Committee’s symmetric 2 percent objective are the most likely outcomes, but uncertainties about this outlook remain.
As the Committee contemplates the future path of the target range for the federal funds rate, it will continue to monitor the implications of incoming information for the economic outlook and will act as appropriate to sustain the expansion, with a strong labor market and inflation near its symmetric 2 percent objective.
In determining the timing and size of future adjustments to the target range for the federal funds rate, the Committee will assess realized and expected economic conditions relative to its maximum employment objective and its symmetric 2 percent inflation objective.
This assessment will take into account a wide range of information, including measures of labor market conditions, indicators of inflation pressures and inflation expectations, and readings on financial and international developments.
The Committee will conclude the reduction of its aggregate securities holdings in the System Open Market Account in August, two months earlier than previously indicated.
Voting for the monetary policy action were Jerome H. Powell, Chair; John C. Williams, Vice Chair; Michelle W. Bowman; Lael Brainard; James Bullard; Richard H. Clarida; Charles L. Evans; and Randal K. Quarles.
Voting against the action were Esther L. George and Eric S. Rosengren, who preferred at this meeting to maintain the target range for the federal funds rate at 2-1/4 to 2-1/2 percent.
The term “monetary policy” refers to the actions undertaken by a central bank, such as the Federal Reserve, to influence the availability and cost of money and credit to help promote national economic goals. The Federal Reserve Act of 1913 gave the Federal Reserve responsibility for setting monetary policy.
The Federal Reserve controls the three tools of monetary policy–open market operations, the discount rate, and reserve requirements. The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System is responsible for the discount rate and reserve requirements, and the Federal Open Market Committee is responsible for open market operations. Using the three tools, the Federal Reserve influences the demand for, and supply of, balances that depository institutions hold at Federal Reserve Banks and in this way alters the federal funds rate. The federal funds rate is the interest rate at which depository institutions lend balances at the Federal Reserve to other depository institutions overnight.
Changes in the federal funds rate trigger a chain of events that affect other short-term interest rates, foreign exchange rates, long-term interest rates, the amount of money and credit, and, ultimately, a range of economic variables, including employment, output, and prices of goods and services.
Structure of the FOMC
The Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) consists of twelve members–the seven members of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System; the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York; and four of the remaining eleven Reserve Bank presidents, who serve one-year terms on a rotating basis. The rotating seats are filled from the following four groups of Banks, one Bank president from each group: Boston, Philadelphia, and Richmond; Cleveland and Chicago; Atlanta, St. Louis, and Dallas; and Minneapolis, Kansas City, and San Francisco. Nonvoting Reserve Bank presidents attend the meetings of the Committee, participate in the discussions, and contribute to the Committee’s assessment of the economy and policy options.
The FOMC holds eight regularly scheduled meetings per year. At these meetings, the Committee reviews economic and financial conditions, determines the appropriate stance of monetary policy, and assesses the risks to its long-run goals of price stability and sustainable economic growth.
The FOMC holds eight regularly scheduled meetings during the year and other meetings as needed. Links to policy statements and minutes are in the calendars below. The minutes of regularly scheduled meetings are released three weeks after the date of the policy decision. Committee membership changes at the first regularly scheduled meeting of the year.
FOIA
The FOMC makes an annual report pursuant to the Freedom of Information Act. The FOMC FOIA Service Center provides information about the status of FOIA requests and the FOIA process.
Story 1: When The Circus Came To Town and Nobody Came — Send In The Socialist Clowns — Walk Like A Man — Santa Claus Socialist: Vote For Me and I Will Give You Free Stuff Paid For By Higher Taxes and More Debt — Democrat Demolition Derby — Videos —
Isn’t it rich?
Are we a pair?
Me here at last on the ground,
You in mid-air,
Where are the clowns?
Isn’t it bliss?
Don’t you approve?
One who keeps tearing around,
One who can’t move,
Where are the clowns?
There ought to be clowns?
Just when I’d stopped opening doors,
Finally knowing the one that I wanted was yours
Making my entrance again with my usual flair
Sure of my lines
No one is there
Don’t you love farce?
My fault, I fear
I thought that you’d want what I want
Sorry, my dear!
But where are the clowns
Send in the clowns
Don’t bother, they’re here
Isn’t it rich?
Isn’t it queer?
Losing my timing this late in my career
But where are the clowns?
There ought to be clowns
Well, maybe next year
Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey – 145th Clown Alley Mash Up
Clown Car
Divine – Walk Like A Man (1985) HQ
DIVINE – YOU THINK YOU’RE A MAN (Extended Video Edit)
Watch Highlights From Round 1 Of The First Democratic Debate | NBC News
The First 2019 Democratic Debate: The Key Moments | NYT News
Biggest moments from 1st Democratic debate
CBSN full coverage and analysis of the first Democratic debate night
Democratic Debate: Every Candidate Names The Country’s Biggest Threat | NBC New York
Gutfeld on Wednesday’s debate
Jimmy Recaps Night One of the First Democratic Debate
How candidates are prepping for first round of Democratic debates
All Eyes On Elizabeth Warren At First Democrats Debate | Morning Joe | MSNBC
2020 Democratic hopefuls set to take the stage in first debate
Victor Davis Hanson on “The Case For Trump”
WARS AND RUMORS OF WARS
MEMO TO TRUMP: TRADE BOLTON FOR TULSI
Pat Buchanan: Congresswoman would deliver foreign policy Trump has not
“For too long our leaders have failed us, taking us into one regime-change war after the next, leading us into a new cold war and arms race, costing us trillions of our hard-earned taxpayer dollars and countless lives. This insanity must end.”
Donald Trump, circa 2016?
Nope. That denunciation of John Bolton interventionism came from Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii during Wednesday night’s Democratic debate. At 38, she was the youngest candidate on stage.
Gabbard proceeded to rip both the “president and his chickenhawk cabinet (who) have led us to the brink of war with Iran.”
In a fiery exchange, Rep. Tim Ryan of Ohio countered that America cannot disengage from Afghanistan: “When we weren’t in there they started flying planes into our buildings.”
“The Taliban didn’t attack us on 9/11,” Gabbard replied, “Al-Qaida attacked us on 9/11. That’s why I and so many other people joined the military, to go after al-Qaida, not the Taliban.”
When Ryan insisted we must stay engaged, Gabbard shot back:
“Is that what you will tell the parents of those two soldiers who were just killed in Afghanistan? ‘Well, we just have to be engaged.’ As a solider, I will tell you, that answer is unacceptable. … We are no better off in Afghanistan that we were when this war began.”
Breakouts, burns and zingers: What to watch in Dem debates
By LAURIE KELLMANtoday
Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., holds a town hall on the Florida International University campus on Tuesday, June 25, 2019, in Miami. (Jennifer King/Miami Herald via AP)
WASHINGTON (AP) — Sixty seconds for answers, a television audience of millions and, for some candidates, a first chance to introduce themselves to voters.
The back-to-back Democratic presidential debates beginning Wednesday are exercises in competitive sound bites featuring 20 candidates hoping to oust President Donald Trump in 2020. The participants range widely in age, sex and backgrounds and include a former vice president, six women and a pair of mayors.
The challenge: Convey their plans for the nation, throw a few elbows and sharpen what’s been a blur of a race so far for many Americans.
What to watch Wednesday at 9 p.m. Eastern on NBC, MSNBC and Telemundo:
___
WHAT’S HER PLAN?
Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s task is to harness her campaign’s momentum to convince voters that she has what it takes to defeat Trump. As the sole top-tier candidate on stage Wednesday, she could have the most to lose.
The Massachusetts senator and former Harvard professor is known for her many policy plans and a mastery of classical, orderly debate. But presidential showdowns can be more “Gladiator”-style than the high-minded “Great Debaters.”
This is no time for a wonky multipoint case for “Medicare for All,” student debt relief or the Green New Deal.
So, one challenge for Warren, 70, is stylistic. Look for her to try to champion her progressive ideas — and fend off attacks from lesser-known candidates — with gravitas, warmth and the brevity required by the format.
“Preparing for the debates is trying to learn to speak in 60 seconds or less,” she said in Miami, ahead of a visit she live-streamed to a migrant detention center in Homestead, Florida.
Another obstacle is to do so without alienating the moderate voters any Democrat would need in a general election to beat Trump.
Being the front-runner on stage conveys a possible advantage: If the others pile on Warren, she gets more time to speak because the candidates are allowed 30 extra seconds for responses.
___
WHO’S THAT?
There may be some familiar faces across the rest of the stage, such as New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, 50, or former Texas congressman Beto O’Rourke, 46. But a few names probably won’t ring any bells at all.
These virtual strangers to most Americans may be enjoying their first — and maybe last — turn on the national stage, so they have the least to lose.
Take John Delaney, 56, a former member of the House from Maryland. Look for him to try to make an impression by keeping up his criticism of Warren’s plans.
Or Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan, 45, who sits on the powerful House Appropriations Committee. He has likened the Democratic primary to “speed dating with the American people.”
For several of the candidates onstage Wednesday, the forum is about finding the breakout moment — a zinger, a burn — that stays in viewers’ minds, is built for social media and generates donations, the lifeblood of campaigns.
In 2015, Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina won applause and a short surge for her response to Trump, who had been quoted in Rolling Stone as criticizing Fiorina’s face.
“Look at that face,” Trump was quoted as saying. “Would anyone vote for that?”
Asked on CNN to respond, Fiorina evenly replied: “I think women all over this country heard very clearly what Mr. Trump said.”
For candidates such as O’Rourke, a breakthrough moment on Wednesday is critical to revitalizing a campaign that has faded. The 10 White House contenders have two hours on stage that night and up until the curtain rises on the star-studded second debate the next day to make their mark. Former Vice President Joe Biden, 76, and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, 77, headline Thursday’s debate and are certain to take up much of the spotlight.
___
BREAKING OUT BADLY
An “oops” moment can be politically crippling to any presidential campaign.
Just ask Energy Secretary Rick Perry, the former Texas governor who, in a 2011 debate, blanked on the third agency of government he had said would be “gone” if he became president.
“Commerce, Education and the, uh, what’s the third one there?” Perry said.
“EPA?” fellow Republican Ron Paul offered. Yep, Perry said, the Environmental Protection Agency.
“Oops,” he finished. Perry’s campaign, already struggling, never recovered.
___
WHAT ISSUES?
There’s simply no time for an in-depth discussion of issues. But the migrant crisis would be an apt topic, even in shorthand. Dominating the news in the hours before the showdown were vivid news reports and images of the toll of the administration’s policy on children, especially.
Expect at least a mention, or perhaps the appearance, of a bracing photo of the bodies of a migrant father and his 23-month-old daughter face-down along the Rio Grande.
In addition to Warren, other candidates were visiting the migrant center in Homestead, Florida, while they were in Miami for the debates.
___
TRUMP
This is the Democrats’ night.
But Trump has dominated the political conversation since that escalator ride four years ago, and he loathes being upstaged. It’s worth asking: Will he tweet during the debates? And if he does, will NBC and the moderators ignore him or respond in real time?
NBC News executive Rashida Jones said the focus will be on the candidates and the issues.
“Beyond that, it has to rise to a certain level,” she said.
During Wednesday’s debate, Trump will be on Air Force One on his way to the Group of 20 summit in Osaka, Japan. The plane’s cable televisions are usually turned to Fox News, which is not hosting the debates. For the second debate, Trump will be beginning meetings at the G-20.
Trump told Fox Business Network on Wednesday that he’d watch because “it’s part of my life” but that “It just seems very boring. … That’s a very unexciting group of people.”
Their mother was a Chicana political activist who helped establish the Chicano political party La Raza Unida,[8] and who ran unsuccessfully for the San Antonio City Council in 1971.[5] Castro once stated, “My mother is probably the biggest reason that my brother and I are in public service. Growing up, she would take us to a lot of rallies and organizational meetings and other things that are very boring for an 8-, 9-, 10-year-old”.[9] His father, Jessie Guzman, is a retired mathematics teacher and political activist. Never married, Rosie and Jessie separated when Castro and his brother were eight years old.[8] Castro’s Texan roots trace back to 1920, when his grandmother Victoria Castro joined extended family members there as a six-year-old orphan from northern Mexico.[5]
Castro graduated from Stanford in 1996 with a bachelor’s degree in political science and communications. He said he began thinking about entering politics while at Stanford,[8] where he and his brother launched their first campaigns and won student senate seats, tying for the highest number of votes.[5] Castro has credited affirmative action for his admission into Stanford, telling The New York Times, “Joaquin and I got into Stanford because of affirmative action. I scored 1210 on my SATs, which was lower than the median matriculating student. But I did fine in college and in law school. So did Joaquin. I’m a strong supporter of affirmative action because I’ve seen it work in my own life”.[14] Between his sophomore and junior years, Castro worked as an intern at the White House during the presidency of Bill Clinton.[15]
Castro meets with U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid on July 7, 2014
In 2001, Castro was elected to the San Antonio City Council, winning 61 percent of the vote against five challengers. At age 26 he was the youngest city councilman in San Antonio history, surpassing Henry Cisneros, who won his council seat in 1975 at age 27. Castro represented District 7, a precinct on the city’s west side with 115,000 residents. The population was 70 percent Hispanic and included a large number of senior citizens.[20] As a councilman from 2001 to 2005, he opposed a PGA-approved golf course and large-scale real estate development on the city’s outer rim.[21]
Castro ran for mayor of San Antonio in 2005 and was widely viewed as the front runner in a field that also included retired judge Phil Hardberger and conservative city councilman Carroll Schubert. He was defeated by approximately 4000 votes when Hardberger received 51.5% of the votes in the runoff.[22][23] Following his election defeat, Castro established his own law practice.[15]
Castro ran for mayor of San Antonio again in 2009. Castro hired Christian Archer, who had run Hardberger’s campaign in 2005, to run his own 2009 campaign.[15] Castro won the election on May 9, 2009 with 56.23% of the vote, his closest opponent being Trish DeBerry-Mejia.[24] He became the fifth Latino mayor in the history of San Antonio. He was the youngest mayor of a top-50 American city.[25] Castro easily won re-election in 2011 and 2013, receiving 82.9% of the vote in 2011[26] and 67% of the vote in 2013.[27]
In 2010, Castro created SA2020, a community-wide visioning effort. It generated a list of goals created by the people of San Antonio based on their collective vision for San Antonio in the year 2020. SA2020 then became a nonprofit organization tasked with turning that vision into a reality.[28] Castro also established Cafe College in 2010, offering college guidance to San Antonio-area students. In 2012 he led a voter referendum to expand pre-kindergarten education.[25] Castro persuaded two of the most prominent businessmen in San Antonio, Charles Butt and Joe Robles, to lead an effort to pass a $30 million sales tax to fund the pre-kindergarten education program.[15]
In March 2010, Castro was named to the World Economic Forum‘s list of Young Global Leaders. Later that year, Time magazine placed him on its “40 under 40” list of rising stars in American politics.[29]
On May 22, 2014 the White House announced Castro as the nominee to be the next secretary of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) by President Barack Obama. He was confirmed by the Senate on July 9, 2014 by a vote of 71-26 and replaced Shaun Donovan, who was nominated to be the Director of the Office of Management and Budget.[33] He took office on July 28, 2014.[34] Following the announcement, Castro was discussed as a potential nominee for vice president for the Democratic Party in the 2016 presidential election.[35][36]
On July 28, 2014, his first day in office, Castro was honored at a reception called “Celebrating Latino Cabinet Members” hosted by the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute.[37]
Upon exiting office in 2017, Castro’s final memo outlined various accomplishments of the department under his leadership.[38] These areas included HUD’s work to stabilize the housing market, rebuild communities struck by natural disasters through a $1 billion National Disaster Resilience Competition, expansion of lead safety protections in federally assisted housing, and the Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing rule to “finally fulfill the full obligation of the Fair Housing Act.[39]
Secretary Castro introducing President Obama at an event on the recovering housing sector in Phoenix, Arizona in January 2015.
On October 15, 2015, Castro endorsed Hillary Clinton for president. When Clinton was asked if Castro could be her pick for vice president, she said, “I am going to look really hard at him for anything because that’s how good he is.”[40] Discussion of Castro as a candidate to run on the Democratic ticket with Hillary Clinton increased markedly in January 2016, as the Iowa and New Hampshire primaries approached.[41][42] In late January, Castro began to campaign for Clinton in Iowa, a move interpreted as a test of his appeal to the electorate.[43] In July 2016, the U.S. Office of Special Counsel issued a finding that Castro had violated the Hatch Act by commenting on the 2016 campaign while giving an interview in an official capacity; Castro admitted the error and ordered his team to improve training on the Hatch Act.[44]
Memoir
In October 2018, Castro published his memoir, An Unlikely Journey: Waking Up from My American Dream through Little, Brown and Company.[45]
Castro has already visited the first in the nation New Hampshire primary state in 2018 and delivered the commencement address at New England College in Henniker, New Hampshire, on May 12, 2018. Castro stated that he would make his decision on whether to run in 2020 after the November 2018 mid-term elections.[46] On December 12, 2018, Castro announced the formation of an exploratory committee.[47] The next day, during an episode of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Julián’s brother Joaquin (during a joint appearance by both brothers) stated that he confidently believes that Julián will be running for president.[48]
Castro formally announced his candidacy for the 2020 presidential election on January 12, 2019. Castro would be the first Democratic presidential nominee since 1924 to not serve as vice president, governor or senator.[49] He is the first Texan in the 2020 race, and would be third-youngest president if elected. In his announcement, Castro emphasized Medicare-for-all, universal pre-K and a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants as part of comprehensive immigration reform.[50]
Castro is a supporter of free trade. He has been a strong supporter of the North American Free Trade Agreement while serving as mayor of San Antonio, but has also said that the agreement should be renegotiated to “strengthen worker and environmental protections”.[52][51]
Education
Castro has voiced support for making the first two years of higher education free. He supports universal pre-kindergarten, and managed to institute a pre-kindergarten program for 4-year-olds, funded by higher local taxes, while serving as mayor of San Antonio.[52][53]
Healthcare
Castro has called for universal health care and Medicare for All, and indicated he would consider funding such a program by raising taxes on corporations and the wealthy.[52] He has supported the Affordable Care Act.[54]
Environment
Castro supports the Paris climate accord, and has criticized President Trump’s withdrawal from the agreement. While in office, Castro worked with companies to promote their transition to renewable energy.[52] He has voiced support for a Green New Deal.[55]
In the past, Castro has advocated for an “energy policy that includes fossil fuels”[51] while also “pointing out the benefits of fossil fuel jobs”.[56]
Foreign policy
Syria
Castro has endorsed a gradual withdrawal of U.S. troops from Syria while also criticizing Trump’s approach to the issue.[52]
Campaign finance
Castro has stated that he is “not going to take any PAC money” as a presidential candidate, and has encouraged others to do the same. He had however formed a PAC (Opportunity First) in 2017 which mostly covered his running expenses while also donating to several dozen “young, progressive” Democratic politicians.[57]
Social issues and civil rights
Abortion
Despite his Catholic background, Castro is pro-choice, and has “vigorously” opposed state laws limiting abortion access after the 20th week of pregnancy and other restrictions.[52]
LGBT rights
Castro has been an advocate for LGBT rights and, as mayor, opposed the law in Texas (later overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court) that denied legal recognition to same-sex marriages.[58] He is also a member of Washington D.C. based think tank the Inter-American Dialogue.[59] Castro was the first San Antonio mayor to serve as the grand marshal of the city’s Pride Parade in 2009 and in 2011 led a push to offer domestic partner benefits in the city. In 2012, he joined mayors across the country in signing the “Mayors for the Freedom to Marry” petition for same-sex marriage equality.[60][52]
Castro said in a tweet that transgender persons should be allowed to serve in the armed forces.[52]
Gun rights
Castro supports tighter gun control, and has supported the reinstatement of the assault weapons ban, limiting access to high-capacity magazines, and closing the “gun show loophole”.[52]
Castro supports a pathway to citizenship for most undocumented residents of the US, has opposed President Trump’s “border wall” plan, and has said that the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency needs to be “reconstituted”. Additionally, he asserted in the first Democratic primary candidate debates on June 26, 2019[61] that he would repeal Section 1325[62][52] of Title 8 of the U.S. criminal code, which would decriminalize illegal entry into the U.S., rendering unlawful entry a civil offense instead of a criminal one.
Personal life
In 2007, Castro married Erica Lira, an elementary school teacher. They had a daughter in 2009 and a son in December 2014.[8][63] He is Catholic.[64] He speaks Spanish, but it is reported that he is not fluent, and studied Latin and Japanese in school.[60][65]
On July 28, 2017, Delaney became the first Democrat to announce he is running for president in 2020.[2] Delaney did not run for re-election to Congress in 2018, preferring to focus on his presidential campaign, and David Trone was elected to succeed him.
Early life and education
Delaney grew up in Wood-Ridge, New Jersey, the son of Elaine (Rowe) and Jack Delaney, an electrician. He has Irish ancestry.[3] Delaney claims to be of Catholic faith, and has said that his “social justice orientation” was influenced by his faith “to some extent”.[4] Delaney spent part of his youth working at his father’s construction site.[5]
In 1993, he co-founded Health Care Financial Partners (HCFP), to make loans available to smaller-sized health care service providers purportedly ignored by larger banks.[11] HCFP went public in 1996, and its stock began trading on the New York Stock Exchange in 1998.[12] Health Care Financial Partners was acquired by Heller Financial in 1999.[13]
In 2000, Delaney co-founded CapitalSource, a commercial lender headquartered in Chevy Chase, Maryland; the company provided capital to roughly 5,000 small and mid-size businesses before his departure.[14] In 2010, during Delaney’s tenure as CEO, CapitalSource was awarded a Bank Enterprise Award from the Community Development Financial Institutions Fund by the U.S. Treasury Department for its investment in low-income and economically distressed communities.[15] In 2005, CapitalSource was named one of Washingtonian Magazine’s best places to work for its company culture and employee benefits.[16]
CapitalSource continued to be publicly traded on the NYSE after Delaney’s election, making him the only former CEO of a publicly traded company serving in the 113th United States Congress.[17] In 2014, the lender was absorbed by PacWest Bancorp.[18]
After redistricting, Delaney decided to run for the newly redrawn 6th District against 10-term Republican incumbent Roscoe Bartlett. The district had long been a Republican stronghold, but it had been significantly reconfigured. The Maryland General Assembly shifted heavily Republican Carroll County and a mostly Republican section of Frederick County to the heavily Democratic 8th district. It shifted Republican-tilting sections of Harford and Baltimore counties into the already heavily Republican 1st district. Taking their place was a heavily Democratic spur of western Montgomery County, which ended just two blocks from Delaney’s home in Potomac. The redrawn district, the state’s second-largest, thus includes nearly the entire western portion of the state, but the bulk of its vote is cast in the outer suburbs of Washington, D.C.
On paper, this dramatically altered the district’s demographics, turning it from a heavily Republican district into a Democratic-leaning district. While John McCain carried the 6th with 57 percent of the vote in 2008,[19]Barack Obama would have carried the new 6th with 56 percent.[20] The Montgomery County share of the district has three times as many people as the rest of the district combined.
The shifts were quite controversial, as Republicans accused Democrats of shifting district boundaries in their favor, and former Governor Martin O’Malley later admitted the redrawn districts would favor Democrats. “That was my hope,” O’Malley told attorneys in a deposition. “It was also my intent to create … a district where the people would be more likely to elect a Democrat than a Republican.”[21]
On April 3, 2012, Delaney won the five-candidate Democratic primary field with 54% of the vote. The next closest opponent, State Senator Robert J. Garagiola, received 29% of the vote, 25 points behind Delaney.[25][26]
In the November 6, 2012 general election, Delaney defeated Bartlett by 59%–38%, a 21-point margin. He won the Montgomery County share of the district by almost 56,000 votes, accounting for almost all of the overall 58,900 margin of votes.[27]
2014 election
Delaney faced a closer-than-expected contest for reelection against Republican Dan Bongino, the Republican candidate for Senate in 2012. He ultimately won by just over 2,200 votes, due mainly to swamping Bongino in the Montgomery County portion of the district by over 20,500 votes.[28]Larry Hogan carried the district in his successful run for governor.
2016 election
Delaney won a third term in 2016, taking 56 percent of the vote to Republican Amie Hoeber’s 40 percent.
Tenure
Since his election to Congress, Delaney introduced legislation to end partisan gerrymandering. The Open Our Democracy Act of 2017 would appoint independent redistricting commissions nationwide to end partisan gerrymandering, make Election Day a federal holiday and create an open top-two primary system.[29]
Delaney was ranked as the 53rd most bipartisan member of the U.S. House of Representatives during the 114th United States Congress (and the most bipartisan member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Maryland) in the Bipartisan Index created by The Lugar Center and the McCourt School of Public Policy that ranks members of the United States Congress by their degree of bipartisanship (by measuring the frequency each member’s bills attract co-sponsors from the opposite party and each member’s co-sponsorship of bills by members of the opposite party).[30] In 2015, a similar ranking by the nonpartisan site GovTrack ranked Delaney third highest for bipartisanship among all House Democrats.[31]
Medical Leave for Disabled Veterans Act (H.R. 5165; 114th Congress) – a bill that would relax the criteria for eligible veterans to qualify for FMLA to seek medical treatment for their service-connected disabilities.[37]
Partnership to Build America Act of 2013 (H.R. 2084; 113th Congress) – a bill that would establish the American Infrastructure Fund (AIF).[39]
Infrastructure 2.0 Act (H.R. 1670; 115th Congress) – a bill that uses revenue from international tax reform to fund an infrastructure bank and the Highway Trust Fund.[40]
Medical Foods Equity Act of 2013 (H.R. 3665; 113th Congress) – a bill that would extend coverage of medical foods, vitamins, and amino acids to those with metabolic disorders.[41]
Open Our Democracy Act (H.R. 2981; 115th Congress) – a bill proposed to make election day a federal holiday, make all congressional primary elections open elections so all eligible voters can participate in them, and to end gerrymandering by requiring independent commissions to draw the districts in each state.[29][42]
Despite a rumored bid to run against governor Larry Hogan in 2018, Delaney bypassed the 2018 elections altogether. On July 28, 2017, Delaney announced his run for president in 2020 in a Washington Post op-ed.[2]
Delaney has been frequently referred to as a “moderate”. However, he does not entirely identify as such.[43] Delaney has remarked,
People have a hard time labeling me. Some of the things they hear me talking about are on the total progressive or liberal end of the spectrum, and in other ways I’m kind of a solutions-oriented moderate who wants to get things done.[43]
He has received the top score of 100 from the Human Rights Campaign for his support of equality-related legislation, with him stating “No one should be discriminated against because of who they are or who they love” in response to this recognition.[44][45]
Delaney has stated he would support increasing the corporate tax rate to 23 percent “to raise about $200 billion for infrastructure”.[46]
Personal life
Delaney and his wife April (née McClain) met at Georgetown University Law Center and have four daughters. His wife is the Washington, D.C. Director for Common Sense Media, a non-profit organization dedicated to educating families on social media. Two of his daughters attend Northwestern University.
Story 2: Hacking An Election: Google Whistle Blower Reveals Google Progressive Propaganda Programming To Defeat Trump in 2020 — Big Tech Censorship — Algorithmic Fairness With Biased Results and Lies! — Holding Big Tech Accountable — Intellectual Dark Web — Videos —
Sen. Cruz Grills Google on Allegations of Politically Biased Censorship
Ted Cruz GRILLS Google rep over big tech censorship
Tucker: Google wants to hack 2020 election
KVII’s Coverage of Sen. Cruz’s Q&A with Google Representative on Censorship & Bias
Dan Crenshaw Interrogates Social Media Execs on Silencing Conservatives
In a house hearing today, Representative Dan Crenshaw interrogated social media execs on conservative censorship. Crenshaw brought up the recent Project Veritas expose which allegedly uncovered google employees labeling Ben Shapiro and other prominent conservatives as Nazis.
Controlling the Narrative – Google Censorship and Project Veritas
WATERSHED EVENT! More Google Whistleblowers To Go Public!
YouTube blocks professor’s response to alt-right accusations
Bret and Eric Weinstein, Brothers Together at Last (LIVE)
Steven Crowder & Big Tech Influence on Free Speech | Bret Weinstein
Bret Weinstein discusses the controversy surrounding Steven Crowder’s remarks on Carlos Maza and the deeper implications the fallout has on big tech’s influence over censorship and free speech.
Campus Argument Goes Viral As Evergreen State Is Caught In Racial Turmoil (HBO)
Professor objects to no white people on campus demand
Bret Weinstein Testifies to Congress on The Evergreen State College riots, Free Speech & Safe Spaces
Bret Weinstein’s testimony to the House of Representatives about the free speech crisis on U.S. college campuses. The testimony delivered by Dr. Weinstein to the members of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform explained that the crisis isn’t primarily about free speech, and won’t be limited to college campuses for long. Help support my work on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/bretweinstein/ Twitter: @BretWeinstein https://twitter.com/BretWeinstein Excerpt from Dr. Weinstein’s testimony: Oppression Disguised as Equity Testimony of Bret S. Weinstein United States House of Representatives May 22, 2018 Tomorrow is the one year anniversary of the day that 50 Evergreen students–students that I had never met–disrupted my class, accusing me of racism and demanding my resignation. I tried to reason with them. I felt no fear because I knew that, whatever my failings might be, bigotry was not among them. At that moment. I felt sure I could reach these students. I also felt a moral obligation to try. Racism, which squanders human potential, and erodes human dignity, offends me. I am also well versed in the evolutionary logic that makes racism durable. I should have had no trouble establishing common ground. Their response surprised me, and it would take months for me to fully understand what had happened. The protestors had no apparent interest in the very dialog they seemed to invite. I was even more surprised by the protestor’s fervor in shouting down my actual students–some of whom had known me for years. The cruelty and derision reserved for students of color who spoke in my defense was particularly chilling. If not discussion, what did they want? I was one of Evergreen’s most popular professors. I had Evergreen’s version of tenure. Did they really think they could force my resignation based on a meritless accusation? They did think that. And they were right. What I had not counted on was their alliance with Evergreen’s new president. Though the protestors openly humiliated him, the president of the college partnered with the mob in private, handing them concession after concession. We know this because the rioters filmed everything and proudly uploaded it. In one particularly telling video, President Bridges calmly discusses with the leaders of the protest a demand to target STEM faculty based on the empty assertion that scientists are particularly prone to bias. In that same video the president speaks of his plan for those who resist the new order: “Bring ’em in. Train ’em. And if they don’t get it, sanction ’em.” He invites his partners to hold him to it. On the second day of unrest, the police chief called me. Rioters were stopping traffic and searching for someone, car to car. The chief believed it was me. She was worried for my safety and helpless to protect me as the president had ordered her force to “stand down.” What would have transpired if the rioters had found me? I still don’t know, and I strongly suspect they don’t either. The protest at my class did not emerge out of the blue in May, 2017. One year earlier I stood up and spoke in opposition to a dangerous proposal, one that threatened to establish a racial hierarchy amongst faculty. To those who have not faced something similar, this likely sounds hyperbolic. But one can now advance such policies, and almost certainly succeed in passing them, if they are properly draped in weaponized terminology. “Equity”, for example, has taken on special properties. If a person opposes an “equity” proposal, those advancing the proposal are secure in asserting that their opponent is motivated by opposition to racial equity itself: In other words, that they are racist. My opposition to that first “equity” proposal was voiced to my colleagues, with no students present. Demands for my resignation one year later, were not the result of organic student confusion. They were payback for violating a de facto code of faculty conduct in which one’s right to speak is now dictated by adherence to an ascendant orthodoxy in which one’s race, gender and sexual orientation are paramount. The students were on a mission. They were unwitting tools of a witting movement. This committee should take my tale as cautionary. Is there a free speech crisis on college campuses? One can certainly make that argument, but that portrayal is at least as misleading as it is informative. What is occurring on college campuses is about power and control–speech is impeded as a last resort, used when people fail to self-censor in response to a threat of crippling stigma and the destruction of their capacity to earn. Full Hearing: https://oversight.house.gov/hearing/c…
PART ONE: Bret Weinstein, Heather Heying & the Evergreen Equity Council
Bret Weinstein on Life After Evergreen and Being Progressive (Pt. 1)
Heather Heying on Evergreen State, Trumps Election, and Consciousness (Full Interview)
Why the “Intellectual Dark Web” has such a crazy name.
Joe Rogan & Jordan Peterson on the Intellectual Dark Web
Full Jordan Peterson Interview: “Sam Harris, the Intellectual Dark Web & the crisis of the left”
Jordan Peterson, Ben Shapiro, Eric Weinstein, and Dave Rubin LIVE! | Rubin Report
The Mathematical Mind, Peter Thiel and Trump (Eric Weinstein Pt. 1)
Eric Weinstein on paradigm change in Economics
Eric Weinstein: Revolutionary Ideas in Science, Math, and Society | Artificial Intelligence Podcast
Making Sense with Sam Harris #112 — The Intellectual Dark Web (with Eric Weinstein and Ben Shapiro)
The 4 Kinds of Fake News (Eric Weinstein pt. 2)
Tits’ Freudenthal Magic Square and Other Mathematical Theories (Eric Weinstein pt. 3)
Pursuit Of Longevity: Fear Of Death Or Love Of Life? | Michael Hebb & Eric Weinstein
Niall Ferguson on the Intellectual Dark Web and the Culture War (Pt. 1)
Niall Ferguson on Understanding Brexit and Donald Trump (Pt. 2)
Niall Ferguson (historian and author) joins Dave to discuss the ongoing culture war that he and his wife Ayaan Hirsi Ali are fighting and the security and safety concerns that they have as a result, the importance of history, his views on Brexit, Donald Trump, and more.
Tim Pool, Dave Rubin, PragerU CENSORED Youtube Insider Says
We always suspected it, but James O’Keefe has given us the proof of what Google is doing.
Google YouTube Whistleblower Video EXPOSED _FULL Project Veritas
Google Exposed: Dave Rubin Responds
Google Censorship: Taking the Football And Going Home
PINTEREST BANS LIVE ACTION: Lila Rose hits back on Tucker Carlson
Pinterest Whistleblower Tells Tucker About Pinterest Censorship, Termination
Machine Learning: Making Sense of a Messy World
Machine Learning and Human Bias
Finding Solutions for Algorithmic Fairness
Algorithmic Fairness | CRP
Algorithmic Decision Making and the Cost of Fairness
Inherent Trade-Offs in Algorithmic Fairness
Algorithmic fairness and algorithmic discrimination
Dave Rubin of The Rubin Report and I have been discussing the problems that have emerged with Patreon intensely over the last two weeks (most particularly, the banning of Sargon of Akkad [Carl Benjamin]) with all the relevant people in our networks. We talk here about what we have been doing over the last few months, and what steps we are planning to take next. Rubin also posted this video on his channel: http://www.youtube.com/rubinreport
Joe Rogan – The Issue with Patreon Banning Sargon of Akkad
Mastercard Overrules Patreon Now Purging WrongThinkers Too!
We Are Leaving Patreon: Dave Rubin and Jordan Peterson Announcement
Patreon, MasterCard, and Jihad (Discussion with Robert Spencer)
I’ll be LIVE with Robert Spencer tonight at 6:00pm, discussing the Sharia-compliance of Patreon and MasterCard, and the useful idiots who protect jihad from criticism.
Insider Blows Whistle & Exec Reveals Google Plan to Prevent “Trump situation” in 2020 on Hidden Cam
BIG UPDATE: YouTube has REMOVED the video from their platform. The video is still available on this website page.
UPDATE 1: Congressman Louie Gohmert issued a statement, saying “Google should not be deciding whether content is important or trivial and they most assuredly should not be meddling in our election process. They need their immunity stripped…”
UPDATE 2: Google executive Jen Gennai RESPONDED to the video, saying, “I was having a casual chat with someone at a restaurant and used some imprecise language. Project Veritas got me. Well done.”
Insider: Google “is bent on never letting somebody like Donald Trump come to power again.”
Google Head of Responsible Innovation Says Elizabeth Warren “misguided” on “breaking up Google”
Google Exec Says Don’t Break Us Up: “smaller companies don’t have the resources” to “prevent next Trump situation”
Insider Says PragerU And Dave Rubin Content Suppressed, Targeted As “Right-Wing”
LEAKED Documents Highlight “Machine Learning Fairness” and Google’s Practices to Make Search Results “fair and equitable”
Documents Appear to Show “Editorial” Policies That Determine How Google Publishes News
Insider: Google Violates “letter of the law” and “spirit of the law” on Section 230
(New York City) — Project Veritas has released a new report on Google which includes undercover video of a Senior Google Executive, leaked documents, and testimony from a Google insider. The report appears to show Google’s plans to affect the outcome of the 2020 elections and “prevent” the next “Trump situation.”
The report includes undercover footage of longtime Google employee and Head of Responsible Innovation, Jen Gennai saying:
“Elizabeth Warren is saying we should break up Google. And like, I love her but she’s very misguided, like that will not make it better it will make it worse, because all these smaller companies who don’t have the same resources that we do will be charged with preventing the next Trump situation, it’s like a small company cannot do that.”
Said Project Veritas founder James O’Keefe:
“This is the third tech insider who has bravely stepped forward to expose the secrets of Silicon Valley. These new documents, supported by undercover video, raise questions of Google’s neutrality and the role they see themselves fulfilling in the 2020 elections.”
Jen Gennai is the head of “Responsible Innovation” for Google, a sector that monitors and evaluates the responsible implementation of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies. In the video, Gennai says Google has been working diligently to “prevent” the results of the 2016 election from repeating in 2020:
“We all got screwed over in 2016, again it wasn’t just us, it was, the people got screwed over, the news media got screwed over, like, everybody got screwed over so we’re rapidly been like, what happened there and how do we prevent it from happening again.”
“We’re also training our algorithms, like, if 2016 happened again, would we have, would the outcome be different?”
Google: Artificial Intelligence Is For A “fair and equitable” State
According to the insider, Machine Learning Fairness is one of the many tools Google uses to promote a political agenda. Documents leaked by a Google informant elaborate on Machine Learning Fairness and the “algorithmic unfairness” that AI product intervention aims to solve:
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The insider showed Google search examples that show Machine Learning Fairness in action.
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“The reason we launched our A.I. principles is because people were not putting that line in the sand, that they were not saying what’s fair and what’s equitable so we’re like, well we are a big company, we’re going to say it.” – Jen Gennai, Head Of Responsible Innovation, Google
The Google insider explained the impact of artificial intelligence and Machine Learning Fairness:
“They’re going to redefine a reality based on what they think is fair and based upon what they want, and what and is part of their agenda.”
Determining credible news and an editorial agenda. . .
Additional leaked documents detail how Google defines and prioritizes content from different news publishers and how its products feature that content. One document, called the “Fake News-letter” explains Google’s goal to have a “single point of truth” across their products.
Another document received by Project Veritas explains the “News Ecosystem” which mentions “editorial guidelines” that appear to be determined and administered internally by Google. These guidelines control how content is distributed and displayed on their site.
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The leaked documents appear to show that Google makes news decisions about what news they promote and distribute on their site.
Comments made by Gennai raise similar questions. In a conversation with Veritas journalists, Gennai explains that “conservative sources” and “credible sources” don’t always coincide according to Google’s editorial practices.
“We have gotten accusations of around fairness is that we’re unfair to conservatives because we’re choosing what we find as credible news sources and those sources don’t necessarily overlap with conservative sources …”
The insider shed additional light on how YouTube demotes content from influencers like Dave Rubin and Tim Pool:
“What YouTube did is they changed the results of the recommendation engine. And so what the recommendation engine is it tries to do, is it tries to say, well, if you like A, then you’re probably going to like B. So content that is similar to Dave Rubin or Tim Pool, instead of listing Dave Rubin or Tim Pool as people that you might like, what they’re doing is that they’re trying to suggest different, different news outlets, for example, like CNN, or MSNBC, or these left leaning political outlets.”
Internal Google Document: “People Like Us Are Programmed”
An additional document Project Veritas obtained, titled “Fair is Not the Default” says “People (like us) are programmed” after the results of machine learning fairness. The document describes how “unconscious bias” and algorithms interact.
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Veritas is the “Only Way”
Said the insider:
“The reason why I came to Project Veritas is that you’re the only one I trust to be able to be a real investigative journalist. Investigative journalist is a dead career option, but somehow, you’ve been able to make it work. And because of that I came to Project Veritas because I knew that this was the only way that this story would be able to get out to the public.”
“I mean, this is a behemoth, this is a Goliath, I am but a David trying to say that the emperor has no clothes. And, um, being a small little ant I can be crushed, and I am aware of that. But, this is something that is bigger than me, this is something that needs to be said to the American public.”
Project Veritas intends to continue investigating abuses in big tech companies and encourages more Silicon Valley insiders to share their stories through their Be Brave campaign.
As of publishing, Google did not respond to Project Veritas’ request for comment. Additional leaked Google documents can be viewed HERE.
On Monday, Project Veritas released another video exposing leftist media bias with an undercover interview and leaked internal documents from Google. In an act of censorship that could not possibly be an accident, YouTube, which is owned by Google, took the video down within a day of its posting.
Segments of the Project Veritas video, which can still be viewed on the group’s website, include undercover footage of Google executive Jen Gennai sharing her thoughts on the 2016 election, saying, “We all got screwed over in 2016 … so we’ve rapidly been like what happened there, and how do we prevent it from happening again?”
She continued to say that Google altered its algorithms to promote its own political idea of “fairness,” adding, “The same people who voted for the current president … do not agree with our definition of fairness.”
The defector Google employee explained Gennai’s comments from his perspective: “What they’re really saying about fairness is that they have to manipulate their search results so that it gives them the political agenda that they want. … What she’s trying to do is she’s trying to sell a product that’s not objective, that doesn’t represent the will of its users, but instead represents the will of a group of people making decisions behind the shadows.”
Gennai responded to the video, admitting it was authentic and that she was tricked, but stating the spliced segments promoted “debunked conspiracies” and that “Google has no notion of political ideology in its rankings.” I’m authentically searching for the truth, so I’d happily hear Gennai out on this matter. But Gennai, and Silicon Valley as a whole, have not provided convincing evidence to defend themselves. And the evidence against them is quite damning.
Later in the Project Veritas video, the Google leaker provided an example of leftist bias that anyone can see for themselves. If you type the words “men can” into Google, the auto-complete function creates ridiculous phrases such as “men can have babies,” “men can get pregnant,” and “men can have periods.”
“People aren’t searching for this. … All of these examples are part of the social justice narrative, and so the sources of truth that [Google] is selecting to amplify are saying these keywords,” the leaker said.
The leaker also said many conservative content creators, such as Dave Rubin, Steven Crowder, and PragerU are being censored, demonetized, and hidden from normal YouTube search functions to decrease their popularity.
“YouTube is targeting what they consider to be right-wing news commentators,” he said. “They’re deciding they don’t want these opinions to have wide appeal … they’re coming in and they’re putting their thumb down, and they’re deciding what content the users are allowed to see.”
These are the highlights of the 25-minute video, but the full video is worth watching if you have the time. Evidently, it was important enough for YouTube to take it down within a day, an action that ironically seems to give the allegations even more credibility. (See the Streisand effect.)
As Dave Rubin said yesterday, “Censoring a video about censorship seems very censorshippy to me.”
Jesus Mendez, the SEO Director at MailOnline, which operators DailyMail.co.uk, has admitted publicly that the site took a massive hit by the June 2019 Google core updatewhich began rolling out June 3rd. He said the site “lost 50% of daily traffic” because of this Google update.
It is very rare for a publishing site that large to admit they were hit by a Google update – extremely rare to see a post about it in a public forum. But the transparency is clear and honest, which I do love. It launched in 2003, and according to Wikipedia it is/was “the most visited English-language newspaper website in the world, with over 11.34m visitors daily in August 2014.” Heck, I even wrote how smart they were when they hid an easter egg in their robots.txt file to hire a savvy SEO for their publication.
But now, the site lost 50% of its traffic, with an additional 90% drop in their Google Discover traffic – which can hurt big time for a publication that size.
Jesus Mendez wrote in as Google Webmaster Help thread “The day after the broad core algorithm update (June 3rd) we saw a massive drop in Search traffic from Google (lost 50% of daily traffic). This was a drop over the course of 24-hours and we have not made any changes to the site. Further, we saw our Discover traffic drop by 90% and has not improved. This is across all verticals, devices, AMP and Non-AMP. ”
Here is a screen shot of the full post (click to enlarge):
There are no responses to this post – but wowza. We know this update can be big for some sites but the DailyMail really felt it!
Trump is right: More than Facebook & Twitter, Google threatens democracy, online freedom
Brad Parscale, Opinion contributorPublished 2:40 p.m. ET Sept. 10, 2018 | Updated 8:35 p.m. ET Sept. 10, 2018
Google, YouTube and other tech giants filter, suppress and even directly attack conservatives. This must stop to protect our free and open society.
Americans must be wary of powerful institutions that seek to control what we see and hear.
As the internet has become an increasingly central part of modern life, Big Tech giants such as Facebook, Twitter and Google have increasingly sought to become the gatekeepers of the internet and political discourse. Without any sort of democratic mandate, these companies have appointed themselves the arbiters of acceptable thought, discussion and searches online.
These companies’ pervasive command of the internet — and blatant desire to control how we interact with it — is a direct threat to a free society. And arguably the worst offender is Google.
Google claims to value free expression and a free and open internet, but there is overwhelming evidence that the Big Tech giant wants the internet to be free and open only to political and social ideas of which it approves.
“Google & others are suppressing voices of conservatives and hiding information and news that is good. They are controlling what we can & cannot see. This is a very serious situation-will be addressed!” President Trump tweeted last month.
Google has directly targeted Republicans
The president is absolutely right.
During the 2016 presidential campaign, Google was accused of manipulating search results to favor Hillary Clinton’s candidacy. Also, research at Harvard University found that Google’s search rankings are not objective, and in 2017, the company was fined billions of dollars by the European Union for manipulating search results.
Google also maintains at least nine shadowy blacklists that affect what the public sees when using its search engine.
When it’s not manipulating the internet to prevent users from viewing right-wing content, Google is directly attacking that content. A report by The Daily Caller News Foundation revealed that Google’s fact-checking service “fact-checked” only conservative news websites, and that in many cases, these fact-checks were outright wrong. What does it say about the fact-checker when its fact-checking is biased and incorrect?
Sometimes, the tech giant just attacks conservatives directly. In one infamous example, a Google search result listed “Nazism” as an official ideology of the California GOP. North Carolina Sen. Trudy Wade, a Republican, was shocked to discover that the top search result for her name returned a photo labeling her as a bigot.
“This is speech discrimination plain and simple, censorship based entirely on unspecified ideological objection to the message or on the perceived identity and political viewpoint of the speaker” – 36th Governor of California Pete Wilson Browne, George, Ross LLP
LOS ANGELES — Prager University (PragerU) has filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California to stop Google and YouTube from unlawfully censoring its educational videos and discriminating against its right to freedom of speech.
The lawsuit cites more than 50 PragerU videos which have either been “restricted” or “demonetized” by Google/YouTube. The PragerU videos range on various subjects presenting a conservative point of view, and include a video by noted Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz on the founding of Israel. PragerU previously compiled a complete list of their restricted videos here, which includes: “Why America Must Lead,” “The Ten Commandments: Do Not Murder,” “Why Did America Fight the Korean War,” and “The World’s Most Persecuted Minority: Christians.”
In correspondence cited in the filing, Google/YouTube made it clear that the censorship of certain videos was because they were deemed “inappropriate” for younger audiences.
“Watch any one of our videos and you’ll immediately realize that Google/YouTube censorship is entirely ideologically driven. For the record, our videos are presented by some of the finest minds in the Western world, including four Pulitzer Prize winners, former prime ministers, and professors from the most prestigious universities in America,” stated PragerU founder Dennis Prager.
Prager added, “They are engaging in an arbitrary and capricious use of their ‘restricted mode’ and ‘demonetization’ to restrict non-left political thought. Their censorship is profoundly damaging because Google and YouTube own and control the largest forum for public participation in video-based speech in not only California, but the United States, and the world.”
The total number of people who currently use YouTube exceeds 1.3 billion people. Google and YouTube advertise YouTube to the public as a forum intended to defend and protect free speech where members of the general public may express and exchange their ideas. They have represented that their platforms and services are intended to effectuate the exercise of free speech among the public. According to Google and YouTube: “voices matter.” YouTube states that it is “committed to fostering a community where everyone’s voice can be heard.”
“However,” said Eric George of Browne George Ross, the firm representing PragerU, “Google and YouTube use restricted mode filtering not to protect younger or sensitive viewers from ‘inappropriate’ video content, but as a political gag mechanism to silence PragerU. Google and YouTube do this not because they have identified video content that violates their guidelines or is otherwise inappropriate for younger viewers, but because PragerU is a conservative nonprofit organization that is associated with and espouses the views of leading conservative speakers and scholars.”
“This is speech discrimination plain and simple, censorship based entirely on unspecified ideological objection to the message or on the perceived identity and political viewpoint of the speaker,” said former California Governor Pete Wilson of Browne George Ross. “Google and YouTube’s use of restricted mode filtering to silence PragerU violates its fundamental First Amendment rights under both the California and United States Constitutions. It constitutes unlawful discrimination under California law, is a misleading and unfair business practice, and breaches the warranty of good faith and fair dealing implied in Google and YouTube’s own Terms of Use and ‘Community Guidelines.’”
“There is absolutely nothing ‘inappropriate’ about the content of the PragerU videos censored by Google and YouTube; the videos do not contain any profanity, nudity or otherwise inappropriate ‘mature’ content and they fully comply with the letter of YouTube’s Terms of Use and Community Guidelines,” said Marissa Streit, PragerU’s chief executive officer who has engaged in a year-long-effort to try and persuade Google to stop censoring PragerU content. Streit continues, “It’s clear that someone doesn’t like what we teach and so they intend on stopping us from teaching it. Can you imagine what the world would look like if Google is allowed to continue to arbitrarily censor ideas they simply don’t agree with?”
“This is not a left/right issue. It is a free speech issue, which is why prominent liberals, such as Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz, are supporting our lawsuit,” Prager concluded.
The lawsuit filed in the Northern District of California is available here.
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PRESS INQUIRES CONTACT: The KAIROS Company for Prager University | Johnnie@theKcompany.co | 434-426-5310
Advisory Legal Council: Former Governor Pete Wilson’s Law Firm, Browne, George and Ross; Eric George; Alan Dershowitz; Barak Lurie, Kelly Shackelford, Mat Staver; and additional prominent attorneys.
PragerU, founded by Dennis Prager in 2011, is a not-for-profit organization that helps millions understand the values that shaped America and provides millions of Americans and people around the world with the intellectual ammunition they need to advocate for limited government, individual responsibility and economic freedom. In 2016 alone, PragerU’s videos received over 250 million views, a figure that will eclipse 350 million in 2017. PragerU is a resource for all who value liberty. It is a threat to all those who do not.
Crowdfunding platform Patreon is grappling with fiat currency centralization after MasterCard demanded it must block the account of a prominent US author and several others.
SPENCER: PATREON ‘AXED’ ME
Citing an email from the company in August, Robert Spencer, who penned multiple books about countering Jihad and advised law enforcement agencies, said it had “axed” him and he could no longer put contributed funds to any use.
“I’ve been axed from Patreon, without explanation, warning or notice – no doubt as part of the ongoing efforts of the Left to deny all platforms to those who reject its agenda,” he wrote on Twitter. “To those who supported me there, thank you, and I’m sorry we couldn’t follow through on plans.”
Responding publicly, Patreon denied it had chosen to ban Spencer, alleging that “unfortunately Mastercard required” it to “remove” his account.
Hi Robert, we emailed you earlier today which explained that unfortunately Mastercard required us to remove your account. You replied to us but if you have further questions we’re happy to keep emailing.
Patreon has since gained negative publicity for further bans, including last week’s move against podcast host Sam Harris.
A HISTORY OF CENSORSHIP
It remains unknown what had led to the decision, with commentators from both within and outside the cryptocurrency community immediately accusing the payment processor of censorship.
“Trusted third parties are security holes (a phrase coined by Bitcoin pioneer Nick Szabo). Escape through bitcoin,” one wrote, while a popular response to the Twitter thread accused Patreon of providing a “fairly lame excuse.”
“Your agreements clearly say nothing about Mastercard. So what gives?” it reads.
Are you saying that this 3rd Party has control over who you support and protect, and who you do not? Sounds like you’ve set a terrible precedent.
Patreon is far from the first company to fall foul of payment networks. As Bitcoinistreported, PayPal has regularly blocked or limited activities of Bitcoin businesses and users over the years.
In October, the practice continued, PayPal banning censorship-resistant social media platform Gab several months after US exchange Coinbase did the same. Coinbase also targeted WikiLeaks in April this year.
Crypto pundits have become visibly more irked by censorship policies this year, calling for mass boycotts of payment processors and other platforms such as Twitter in favor of politically-neutral open-source payments alternatives such as Bitcoin.
What do you think about Patreon blocking Robert Spencer? Let us know in the comments below!
Patreon (/ˈpeɪtriɒn/) is an American crowdfunding membership platform that provides business tools for creators to run a subscription content service, with ways for artists to build relationships and provide exclusive experiences to their subscribers, or “patrons”.[2]
Patreon is popular among YouTubevideographers, webcomic artists, writers, podcasters, musicians, and other categories of creators who post regularly online.[3] It allows artists to receive funding directly from their fans, or patrons, on a recurring basis or per work of art.[4] The company, started by musician Jack Conte[5] and developer Sam Yam[5][6] in 2013, is based in San Francisco.[7]
In return for the service, Patreon charges a commission of 5% for each donation and 5% in transaction fees, thus allowing the creator to get 90% of the donations.[8]
History
Logo used from May 2013–June 2017.
Patreon was co-founded in May 2013 by Sam Yam and musician Jack Conte,[5] who was looking for a way to make a living from his popular YouTube videos.[9] Together with Sam Yam he developed a platform that allows ‘patrons’ to pay a set amount of money every time an artist creates a work of art. The company raised $2.1 million in August 2013 from a group of venture capitalists and angel investors.[10][11] In June 2014, Patreon raised a further $15 million in a series A round led by Danny Rimer of Index Ventures.[12][13] In January 2016, the company closed on a fresh round of $30 million in a series B round, led by Thrive Capital, which put the total raised for Patreon at $47.1 million.[14]
They signed up more than 125,000 ‘patrons’ in their first 18 months.[15] In late 2014, the website announced that patrons were sending over $1,000,000 per month to the site’s content creators.[16]
In March 2015, Patreon acquired Subbable, a similar voluntary subscription service created by the Green brothers, John and Hank Green, and brought over Subbable creators and contents, including CGP Grey, Destin Sandlin‘s Smarter Every Day, and the Green brothers’ own CrashCourse and SciShow channels.[17] The merger was consequent of an expected migration of payment systems with Amazon Payments that Subbable used.
In October 2015, the site was the target of a large cyber-attack, with almost 15 gigabytes of password data, donation records, and source code taken and published. The breach exposed more than 2.3 million unique e-mail addresses and millions of private messages.[18][19] Following the attack, some patrons received extortion emails demanding Bitcoin payments in exchange for the protection of their personal information.[20][21][22]
In July 2016, Patreon sent out an email[23] to its users, announcing changes for its more adult-oriented creators. Notably, content creators working under the “Not Safe For Work” (NSFW) categories on Patreon can now accept payments through PayPal via PayPal’s subsidiary Braintree. This move now allows Adult Content creators on Patreon to accept payment more easily. Prior to this change, these creators could only accept payments through credit cards.[24]
In January 2017, Patreon announced that it had sent over $100,000,000 to creators since its inception.[25]
In May 2017, Patreon announced that it had over 50,000 active creators, 1 million monthly patrons, and was on track to send over $150 million to creators in 2017.[26]
In June 2017, Patreon announced a suite of tools for creators to run membership businesses on the Patreon platform. Notable improvements included a CRM system, a mobile app called Lens, and a service to set up exclusive livestreams.[27]
In August 2018, Patreon announced the acquisition of Memberful, a membership services company.[28]
Business model
Patreon users are grouped by content type, such as video/films, podcast, comedy, comics, games, and education. These content creators set up a page on the Patreon website, where patrons can choose to pay a fixed amount to a creator on a monthly basis.[29]Alternatively, content creators can configure their page so that patrons pay every time the artist releases a new piece of art. A creator typically displays a goal that the ongoing revenue will go towards, and can set a maximum limit of how much they receive per month. Patrons can cancel their payment at any time. Creators typically provide membership benefits (commonly in the form of exclusive content or behind-the-scenes work) for their patrons, depending on the amount that each patron pays.[30][31]
Patrons can unlock monetary tiers that increase the content type they see from the user. A number of content creators on Patreon are also YouTubers. They are able to create content on multiple platforms, and while the YouTube videos may be available to the public, the patrons receive private content made exclusively for them in exchange for aiding the Patreon user’s goal.[32] Patreon takes a 5% commission on pledges. As of May 2017, the average pledge per patron was around $12, and a new patron pledged to a creator every 5.5 seconds.[33]
As of February 2014, almost half of the artists on Patreon produce YouTube videos, while most of the rest are writers, webcomics artists, musicians, or podcasters.[34] As of December 2016, Patreon’s Community Guidelines allow nudity and suggestive imagery as long as they are clearly marked, but prohibit content that may be deemed pornographic or as glorifying sexual violence.[35]
Unlike other online platforms such as YouTube and Facebook, which use trained algorithms to identify potentially inappropriate content, Patreon’s trust and safety team monitors users and investigates complaints of Terms of Service violations.[36]
Controversies
In July 2017, conservative journalist and YouTube personality Lauren Southern was banned from Patreon over concerns about Génération Identitaire‘s blocking of NGO ships in the Mediterranean. A letter she received from Patreon said she was removed for “raising funds in order to take part in activities that are likely to cause loss of life,” referring to an incident in May involving Southern, and the larger Defend Europe mission in July, which she covered on YouTube. Philosopher, writer, and podcast host Sam Harris, who also received contributions from patrons on the website, objected to Patreon’s approach and announced that he would be leaving the platform because of it.[37] Shortly thereafter Patreon deleted the account of It’s Going Down, a hardlineleft-wing news website, for doxing.[24] Patreon CEO Jack Conte subsequently announced that he would be expanding the company’s appeal process, regretting the initial wording of the letter which said “[we] will not consider an appeal”.[citation needed]
In October 2017, Patreon published an expanded version of its community guidelines, triggering a backlash from some adult content creators.[38][39][40] A petition in protest at the changes gained 1,800 signatures, and drew a response from Jack Conte.[41][42]
In December 2017, Patreon announced a service fee starting on December 18, 2017, where some fees would be charged to the patrons rather than all fees being paid by the creator. This caused backlash from a number of creators, including some who saw members of their fanbase withdraw small pledges in response. Under the new payment model, a $1 pledge would have cost a patron $1.38, and a $5 pledge would have cost $5.50, representing a 38% and 10% rise respectively.[43] Due to this backlash and the loss of many pledges for creators, Patreon announced that they would not be rolling out these changes, and apologized to their users.[44]
In December 2018, Patreon banned Milo Yiannopoulos a day after he created an account as well as far-right American political commentator James Allsup.[46] In the same month, Patreon also banned Carl Benjamin because he used homophobic and racist slurs in a YouTube interview in February 2018.[36] Benjamin defended himself, claiming Patreon had taken his words out of context,[47] and that “the video in question should not fall under Patreon’s rules because it was on YouTube.”[36]
This ban was criticized by Sam Harris and American libertarians, who have accused it of being politically motivated.[36] Furthermore, Jordan Peterson announced a plan to launch an alternative service that will be safe from political interference, and jointly announced with Dave Rubin in a January 1, 2019 video that they will be leaving Patreon by January 15, 2019 as a direct response to its treatment of Carl Benjamin.[48][49] On January 15, Peterson and Rubin deleted their Patreon accounts.
Eric WeinsteinCreditCreditDamon Winter/The New York Times
Here are some things that you will hear when you sit down to dinner with the vanguard of the Intellectual Dark Web: There are fundamental biological differences between men and women. Free speech is under siege. Identity politics is a toxic ideology that is tearing American society apart. And we’re in a dangerous place if these ideas are considered “dark.”
I was meeting with Sam Harris, a neuroscientist; Eric Weinstein, a mathematician and managing director of Thiel Capital; the commentator and comedian Dave Rubin; and their spouses in a Los Angeles restaurant to talk about how they were turned into heretics. A decade ago, they argued, when Donald Trump was still hosting “The Apprentice,” none of these observations would have been considered taboo.
Today, people like them who dare venture into this “There Be Dragons” territory on the intellectual map have met with outrage and derision — even, or perhaps especially, from people who pride themselves on openness.
It’s a pattern that has become common in our new era of That Which Cannot Be Said. And it is the reason the Intellectual Dark Web, a term coined half-jokingly by Mr. Weinstein, came to exist.
What is the I.D.W. and who is a member of it? It’s hard to explain, which is both its beauty and its danger.
Most simply, it is a collection of iconoclastic thinkers, academic renegades and media personalities who are having a rolling conversation — on podcasts, YouTube and Twitter, and in sold-out auditoriums — that sound unlike anything else happening, at least publicly, in the culture right now. Feeling largely locked out of legacy outlets, they are rapidly building their own mass media channels.
The closest thing to a phone book for the I.D.W. is a sleek websitethat lists the dramatis personae of the network, including Mr. Harris; Mr. Weinstein and his brother and sister-in-law, the evolutionary biologists Bret Weinstein and Heather Heying; Jordan Peterson, the psychologist and best-selling author; the conservative commentators Ben Shapiro and Douglas Murray; Maajid Nawaz, the former Islamist turned anti-extremist activist; and the feminists Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Christina Hoff Sommers. But in typical dark web fashion, no one knows who put the website up.
The core members have little in common politically. Bret and Eric Weinstein and Ms. Heying were Bernie Sanders supporters. Mr. Harris was an outspoken Hillary voter. Ben Shapiro is an anti-Trump conservative.
Christina Hoff SommersCreditDamon Winter/The New York Times
But they all share three distinct qualities. First, they are willing to disagree ferociously, but talk civilly, about nearly every meaningful subject: religion, abortion, immigration, the nature of consciousness. Second, in an age in which popular feelings about the way things ought to be often override facts about the way things actually are, each is determined to resist parroting what’s politically convenient. And third, some have paid for this commitment by being purged from institutions that have become increasingly hostile to unorthodox thought — and have found receptive audiences elsewhere.
“People are starved for controversial opinions,” said Joe Rogan, an MMA color commentator and comedian who hosts one of the most popular podcasts in the country. “And they are starved for an actual conversation.”
That hunger has translated into a booming and, in many cases, profitable market.Episodes of “The Joe Rogan Experience,” which have featured many members of the I.D.W., can draw nearly as big an audience as Rachel Maddow. A recent episode featuring Bret Weinstein and Ms. Heying talking about gender, hotness, beauty and #MeToo was viewed on YouTube over a million times, even though the conversation lasted for nearly three hours.
Joe RoganCreditDamon Winter/The New York Times
Ben Shapiro’s podcast, which airs five days a week, gets 15 million downloads a month. Sam Harris estimates that his “Waking Up” podcast gets one million listeners an episode. Dave Rubin’s YouTube show has more than 700,000 subscribers.
Offline and in the real world, members of the I.D.W. are often found speaking to one another in packed venues around the globe. In July, for example, Jordan Peterson, Douglas Murray and Mr. Harris will appear together at the O2 Arena in London.
But as the members of the Intellectual Dark Web become genuinely popular, they are also coming under more scrutiny. On April 21, Kanye West crystallized this problem when he tweeted seven words that set Twitter on fire: “I love the way Candace Owens thinks.”
Candace Owens, the communications director for Turning Point USA, is a sharp, young, black conservative — a telegenic speaker with killer instincts who makes videos with titles like “How to Escape the Democrat Plantation” and “The Left Thinks Black People Are Stupid.” Mr. West’s praise for her was sandwiched inside a longer thread that referenced many of the markers of the Intellectual Dark Web, like the tyranny of thought policing and the importance of independent thinking. He was photographed watching a Jordan Peterson video.
All of a sudden, it seemed, the I.D.W. had broken through to the culture-making class, and a few in the group flirted with embracing Ms. Owens as their own.
Yet Ms. Owens is a passionate Trump supporter who has dismissed racism as a threat to black people while arguing, despite evidence to the contrary, that immigrants steal their jobs. She has also compared Jay-Z and Beyoncé to slaves for supporting the Democratic Party.
Many others in the I.D.W. were made nervous by her sudden ascendance to the limelight, seeing Ms. Owens not as a sincere intellectual but as a provocateur in the mold of Milo Yiannopoulos. For the I.D.W. to succeed, they argue, it needs to eschew those interested in violating taboo for its own sake.
“I’m really only interested in building this intellectual movement,” Eric Weinstein said. “The I.D.W. has bigger goals than anyone’s buzz or celebrity.”
And yet, when Ms. Owens and Charlie Kirk, the executive director of Turning Point USA, met last week with Mr. West at the Southern California Institute of Architecture, just outside of the frame — in fact, avoiding the photographers — was Mr. Weinstein. He attended both that meeting and a one-on-one the next day for several hours at the mogul’s request. Mr. Weinstein, who can’t name two of Mr. West’s songs, said he found the Kardashian spouse “kind and surprisingly humble despite his unpredictable public provocations.” He has also tweeted that he’s interested to see what Ms. Owens says next.
This episode was the clearest example yet of the challenge this group faces: In their eagerness to gain popular traction, are the members of the I.D.W. aligning themselves with people whose views and methods are poisonous? Could the intellectual wildness that made this alliance of heretics worth paying attention to become its undoing?
Heather HeyingPhotographs by Damon Winter/The New York Times
There is no direct route into the Intellectual Dark Web. But the quickest path is to demonstrate that you aren’t afraid to confront your own tribe.
The metaphors for this experience vary: going through the phantom tollbooth; deviating from the narrative; falling into the rabbit hole. But almost everyone can point to a particular episode where they came in as one thing and emerged as something quite different.
A year ago, Bret Weinstein and Heather Heying were respected tenured professors at Evergreen State College, where their Occupy Wall Street-sympathetic politics were well in tune with the school’s progressive ethos. Today they have left their jobs, lost many of their friends and endangered their reputations.
All this because they opposed a “Day of Absence,” in which white students were asked to leave campus for the day. For questioning a day of racial segregation cloaked in progressivism, the pair was smeared as racist. Following threats, they left town for a time with their children and ultimately resigned their jobs.
“Nobody else reacted. That’s what shocked me,” Mr. Weinstein said. “It told me that a culture that told itself it was radically open-minded was actually a culture cowed by fear.”
Sam Harris says his moment came in 2006, at a conference at the Salk Institute with Richard Dawkins, Neil deGrasse Tyson and other prominent scientists. Mr. Harris said something that he thought was obvious on its face: Not all cultures are equally conducive to human flourishing. Some are superior to others.
“Until that time I had been criticizing religion, so the people who hated what I had to say were mostly on the right,” Mr. Harris said. “This was the first time I fully understood that I had an equivalent problem with the secular left.”
After his talk, in which he disparaged the Taliban, a biologist who would go on to serve on President Barack Obama’s Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues approached him. “I remember she said: ‘That’s just your opinion. How can you say that forcing women to wear burqas is wrong?’ But to me it’s just obvious that forcing women to live their lives inside bags is wrong. I gave her another example: What if we found a culture that was ritually blinding every third child? And she actually said, ‘It would depend on why they were doing it.’” His jaw, he said, “actually fell open.”
Jordan Peterson
“The moral confusion that operates under the banner of ‘multiculturalism’ can blind even well-educated people to the problems of intolerance and cruelty in other communities,” Mr. Harris said. “This had never fully crystallized for me until that moment.”
Before September 2016, Jordan Peterson was an obscure psychology professor at the University of Toronto. Then he spoke out against Canada’s Bill C-16, which proposed amending the country’s human-rights act to outlaw discrimination based on gender identity and expression. He resisted on the grounds that the bill risked curtailing free speech by compelling people to use alternative gender pronouns. He made YouTube videos about it. He went on news shows to protest it. He confronted protesters calling him a bigot. When the university asked him to stop talking about it, including sending two warning letters, he refused.
While most people in the group faced down comrades on the political left, Ben Shapiro confronted the right. He left his job as editor at large of Breitbart News two years ago because he believed it had become, under Steve Bannon’s leadership, “Trump’s personal Pravda.” In short order, he became a primary target of the alt-right and, according to the Anti-Defamation League, the No. 1 target of anti-Semitic tweets during the presidential election.
Other figures in the I.D.W., like Claire Lehmann, the founder and editor of the online magazine Quillette, and Debra Soh, who has a Ph.D. in neuroscience, self-deported from the academic track, sensing that the spectrum of acceptable perspectives and even areas of research was narrowing. Dr. Soh said that she started “waking up” in the last two years of her doctorate program. “It was clear that the environment was inhospitable to conducting research,” she said. “If you produce findings that the public doesn’t like, you can lose your job.”
When she wrote an op-ed in 2015 titled “Why Transgender Kids Should Wait to Transition,” citing research that found that a majority of gender dysphoric children outgrow their dysphoria, she said her colleagues warned her, “Even if you stay in academia and express this view, tenure won’t protect you.”
Nowadays Ms. Soh has a column for Playboy and picks up work as a freelance writer. But that hardly pays the bills. She’s planning to start a podcast soon and, like many members of the I.D.W., has a Patreon account where “patrons” can support her work.
These donations can add up. Mr. Rubin said his show makes at least $30,000 a month on Patreon. And Mr. Peterson says he pulls in some $80,000 in fan donations each month.
Mr. Peterson has endured no small amount of online hatred and some real-life physical threats: In March, during a lecture at Queen’s University in Ontario, a woman showed up with a garrote. But like many in the I.D.W., he also seems to relish the outrage he inspires.
“I’ve figured out how to monetize social justice warriors,” Mr. Peterson said in January on Joe Rogan’s podcast. On his Twitter feed, he called the writer Pankaj Mishra, who’d written an essay in The New York Review of Books attacking him, a “sanctimonious prick” and said he’d happily slap him.
And the upside to his notoriety is obvious: Mr. Peterson is now arguably the most famous public intellectual in Canada, and his book “12 Rules for Life” is a best-seller.
The exile of Bret Weinstein and Ms. Heying from Evergreen State brought them to the attention of a national audience that might have come for the controversy but has stayed for their fascinating insights about subjects including evolution and gender. “Our friends still at Evergreen tell us that the protesters think they destroyed us,” Ms. Heying said. “But the truth is we’re now getting the chance to do something on a much larger scale than we could ever do in the classroom.”
“I’ve been at this for 25 years now, having done all the MSM shows, including Oprah, Charlie Rose, ‘The Colbert Report,’ Larry King — you name it,” Michael Shermer, the publisher of Skeptic magazine, told me. “The last couple of years I’ve shifted to doing shows hosted by Joe Rogan, Dave Rubin, Sam Harris and others. The I.D.W. is as powerful a media as any I’ve encountered.”
Mr. Shermer, a middle-aged science writer, now gets recognized on the street. On a recent bike ride in Santa Barbara, Calif., he passed a work crew and “the flag man stopped me and says: ‘Hey, you’re that skeptic guy, Shermer! I saw you on Dave Rubin and Joe Rogan!’” When he can’t watch the shows on YouTube, he listens to them as podcasts on the job. On breaks, he told Mr. Shermer, he takes notes.
“I’ve had to update Quillette’s servers three times now because it’s caved under the weight of the traffic,” Ms. Lehmann said about the publication most associated with this movement.
Michael Shermer CreditDamon Winter/The New York Times
Yet there are pitfalls to this audience-supported model. One risk is what Eric Weinstein has called “audience capture.” Since stories about left-wing-outrage culture — the fact that the University of California, Berkeley, had to spend $600,000 on security for Mr. Shapiro’s speech there, say — take off with their fans, members of the Intellectual Dark Web may have a hard time resisting the urge to deliver that type of story. This probably helps explain why some people in this group talk constantly about the regressive left but far less about the threat from the right.
“There are a few people in this network who have gone without saying anything critical about Trump, a person who has assaulted truth more than anyone in human history,” Mr. Harris said. “If you care about the truth, that is quite strange.”
Emphasis is one problem. Associating with genuinely bad people is another.
Go a click in one direction and the group is enhanced by intellectuals with tony affiliations like Steven Pinker at Harvard. But go a click in another and you’ll find alt-right figures like Stefan Molyneux and Milo Yiannopoulos and conspiracy theorists like Mike Cernovich (the #PizzaGate huckster) and Alex Jones (the Sandy Hook shooting denier).
It’s hard to draw boundaries around an amorphous network, especially when each person in it has a different idea of who is beyond the pale.
“I don’t know that we are in the position to police it,” Mr. Rubin said. “If this thing becomes something massive — a political or social movement — then maybe we’d need to have some statement of principles. For now, we’re just a crew of people trying to have the kind of important conversations that the mainstream won’t.”
But is a statement of principles necessary to make a judgment call about people like Mr. Cernovich, Mr. Molyneux and Mr. Yiannopoulos? Mr. Rubin has hosted all three on his show. And he appeared on a typically unhinged episode of Mr. Jones’s radio show, “Infowars.” Mr. Rogan regularly lets Abby Martin — a former 9/11 Truther who is strangely sympathetic to the regimes in Syria and Venezuela — rant on his podcast. He also encouraged Mr. Jones to spout off about the moon landing being fake during Mr. Jones’s nearly four-hour appearance on his show. When asked why he hosts people like Mr. Jones, Mr. Rogan has insisted that he’s not an interviewer or a journalist. “I talk to people. And I record it. That’s it,” he has said.
Mr. Rubin doesn’t see this is a problem. “The fact is that Jones reaches millions of people,” he said. “Going on that show means I get to reach them, and I don’t think anyone is a lost cause. I’ve gotten a slew of email from folks saying that they first heard me on Jones, but then watched a bunch of my interviews and changed some of their views.”
Dave Rubin CreditDamon Winter/The New York Times
The subject came up at that dinner in Los Angeles. Mr. Rubin, whose mentor is Larry King, insisted his job is just to let the person sitting across from him talk and let the audience decide. But with a figure like Mr. Cernovich, who can occasionally sound reasonable, how is a viewer supposed to know better?
Of course, the whole notion of drawing lines to keep people out is exactly what inspired the Intellectual Dark Web folks in the first place. They’re committed to the belief that setting up no-go zones and no-go people is inherently corrupting to free thought.
“You have to understand that the I.D.W. emerged as a response to a world where perfectly reasonable intellectuals were being regularly mislabeled by activists, institutions and mainstream journalists with every career-ending epithet from ‘Islamophobe’ to ‘Nazi,’” Eric Weinstein said. “Once I.D.W. folks saw that people like Ben Shapiro were generally smart, highly informed and often princely in difficult conversations, it’s more understandable that occasionally a few frogs got kissed here and there as some I.D.W. members went in search of other maligned princes.”
But people who pride themselves on pursuing the truth and telling it plainly should be capable of applying these labels when they’re deserved. It seems to me that if you are willing to sit across from an Alex Jones or Mike Cernovich and take him seriously, there’s a high probability that you’re either cynical or stupid. If there’s a reason for shorting the I.D.W., it’s the inability of certain members to see this as a fatal error.
What’s more, this frog-kissing plays perfectly into the hands of those who want to discredit the individuals in this network. In recent days, for example, Mr. Harris has been labeled by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a bridge to the alt-right: “Under the guise of scientific objectivity, Harris has presented deeply flawed data to perpetuate fear of Muslims and to argue that black people are genetically inferior to whites.”
That isn’t true. The group excoriated Mr. Harris, a fierce critic of the treatment of women and gays under radical Islam, for saying that “some percentage, however small” of Muslim immigrants are radicalized. He has also estimated that some 20 percent of Muslims worldwide are Islamists or jihadis. But he has never said that this should make people fear all Muslims. He has defended the work of the social scientist Charles Murray, who argues that genetic differences may explain differences in average IQ across racial groups — while insisting that this does not make one group inferior to another.
But this kind of falsehood is much easier to spread when other figures in the I.D.W. are promiscuous about whom they’ll associate with. When Mr. West tweeted his praise for Ms. Owens, the responses of the people in the network reflected each person’s attitude toward this problem. Dave Rubin took to Twitter to defend Ms. Owens and called Mr. West’s tweet a “game changer.” Jordan Peterson went on “Fox and Friends” to discuss it. Bret Weinstein subtweeted his criticism of these choices: “Smart, skeptical people are often surprisingly susceptible to being conned if a ruse is tailored to their prejudices.” His brother was convinced that Mr. West was playing an elaborate game of chess. Ms. Heying and Mr. Harris ignored the whole thing. Ben Shapiro mostly laughed it off.
Mr. West is a self-obsessed rabble-rouser who brags about not reading books. But whether or not one approves of the superstar’s newest intellectual bauble, it is hard to deny that he has consistently been three steps ahead of the zeitgeist.
So when he tweets “only freethinkers” and “It’s no more barring people because they have different ideas,” he is picking up on a real phenomenon: that the boundaries of public discourse have become so proscribed as to make impossible frank discussions of anything remotely controversial.
“So many of our institutions have been overtaken by schools of thought, which are inherently a dead end,” Bret Weinstein said. “The I.D.W. is the unschooling movement.”
Am I a member of this movement? A few months ago, someone suggested on Twitter that I should join this club I’d never heard of. I looked into it. Like many in this group, I am a classical liberal who has run afoul of the left, often for voicing my convictions and sometimes simply by accident. This has won me praise from libertarians and conservatives. And having been attacked by the left, I know I run the risk of focusing inordinately on its excesses — and providing succor to some people whom I deeply oppose.
I get the appeal of the I.D.W. I share the belief that our institutional gatekeepers need to crack the gates open much more. I don’t, however, want to live in a culture where there are no gatekeepers at all. Given how influential this group is becoming, I can’t be alone in hoping the I.D.W. finds a way to eschew the cranks, grifters and bigots and sticks to the truth-seeking.
“Some say the I.D.W. is dangerous,” Ms. Heying said. “But the only way you can construe a group of intellectuals talking to each other as dangerous is if you are scared of what they might discover.”
Bari Weiss is a staff editor and writer for the Opinion section. @bariweiss
Damon Winter is a staff photographer for the Opinion section.
The intellectual dark web (often abbreviated to IDW) is a neologism coined by American mathematician Eric Weinstein and popularized by Bari Weiss in a 2018 editorial in The New York Times. In its original formulation it referred to collection of public personalities who have largely turned to non-traditional media outlets due to a perceived hostility to unorthodox ideas among established venues and in academia.
The piece by Weiss was met with general but not universal criticism by other writers, political commentators and on social media, including especially the accuracy of the characterization of IDW members as being truly ostracized from mainstream discourse. Opinions vary greatly on the nature of the IDW, the collective political affiliation of its members, and what, if any characteristics unite them as a group.
Origins and reception
The term originally gained popularity in 2018, after a piece was published by staff editor Bari Weiss in The New York Times entitled Meet the Renegades of the Intellectual Dark Web. In the piece, Weiss attributed the coining of the term as a “half-joking” creation of mathematician and economist Eric Weinstein.[1][2] Weiss characterized members of the IDW as “iconoclastic thinkers, academic renegades and media personalities” who have been “purged from institutions that have become increasingly hostile to unorthodox thought,” and instead taken to, and found success, in social media, podcasting, public speaking, or other alternative venues outside what she termed “legacy media”.[1][3]
Others quickly took issue with various aspects of the characterization. Henry Farrell, writing in Vox, who expressed disbelieve that conservative commentator Ben Shapiro or neuroscientist Sam Harris, both identified by Weiss as members of the IDW, could credibly be described as either purged or silenced.[4]Jonah Goldberg, reacting to the piece by Weiss in the National Review, struggled with the concept, writing that it struck him “as a marketing label — and not necessarily a good one”:
…it seems to me this IDW thing isn’t actually an intellectual movement. It’s just a coalition of thinkers and journalists who happen to share a disdain for the keepers of the liberal orthodoxy.[5]
The publication of Weiss’s piece also drew widespread criticism on social media, with those such as fellow New York Times columnist Paul Krugman observing the irony of a piece claiming popular intellectual oppression, which was itself published in the Times, among the most prominent newspapers in the nation.[6] Elsewhere, David A. French contended many of the critics were missing the point, and were instead inadvertently confirming “the need for a movement of intellectual free-thinkers.”[7]
Neither Weiss nor others claim a shared set of political ideals, with some identifying with the political left and others with the political right,[9][1] and members have drawn criticism from both sides of the political spectrum.[1][9][10] For example, The Guardian characterized the IDW as “a coalition of strange bedfellows” that nonetheless comprised the “supposed thinking wing of the alt-right.”[11] However, this characterization has been rejected by others from within the IDW, such as Quillette, founded by Claire Lehmann and described by Politico as the “unofficial digest” of the IDW. Quoting Sam Harris and Daniel Miessler, they have contended that the majority of the most prominent members of the IDW tend to skew toward the left on most political issues, despite also including a number of prominent conservatives who do not.[12][13]
Sources disagree on what, if any unifying factors exist throughout the IDW. Psychology Today characterized it as “generally concerned about political tribalism and free speech”,[14] or as a rejection of “mainstream assumptions about what is true”.[15]The Washington Examiner described the IDW as “remarkably diverse” but united behind a rejection of the “radical intolerance of the far left” and in support of the “free exchange of ideas”, while Salon dubbed it a politically conservative movement united more over a rejection of American liberalism than over any mutually shared beliefs.[16] Alternatively, the National Review posited that, despite comprising “all political persuasions”, IDW was united in a particular conservative leaning conceptualization of injustice and inequality specifically.[17]
Regarding the organization of the IDW, Daniel W. Drezner observed that it is essentially leaderless, and may be individually beholden to their audiences, and unable to progress a coherent agenda.[18] For her part, historian of medicine and science Alice Dreger expressed surprise in being told she was a member of the IDW at all, saying she “had no idea who half the people in this special network were. The few Intellectual Dark Web folks I had met I didn’t know very well. How could I be part of a powerful intellectual alliance when I didn’t even know these people?”[19]
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Story 4: Israel Aerial Global Position Systems (GPS) Disrupted — Russian Cyberweapon GPS Spoofing? — Videos
Why The US Military Made GPS Free-To-Use
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BBC News || Norway LASHES out at Russia for disrupting GPS signals and DEMANDS Putin ‘own up
Norway LASHES out at Russia for disrupting GPS signals and DEMANDS Putin ‘own up
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Russia Suspected Of ‘Jamming GPS’ During NATO – Exercise Trident Juncture 2018
Norway Blames Russia for Disrupting GPS Signal During NATO Drill Wrap-Up
N. Korea fires short range missile and continues jamming GPS: Defense Ministry
North Korea has fired a short-range projectiles and has been conducting GPS jamming operations on the border for about a month becoming a threat to South Korea citizens. The disturbance is seen as an armed protest against the ongoing South Korea – U.S. joint military drills. Kim Hyun-bin has the latest. North Korea fired another short range projectile into the East Sea. South Korea’s defense ministry said on Friday that the missile was fired from Seondeok Hamgyeongnam-do province and flew around 100 kilometers. Experts say the launch appears to be an armed protest against the Nuclear Security Summit currently taking place in Washington. North Korea has also been conducting radio jamming operations targeting South Korea. The South Korean presidential office of Cheong Wa Dae on Friday held an emergency National Security Council meeting and warned Pyongyang to halt the jamming operations as they are becoming a threat to South Korean citizens. Seoul’s defense ministry says the disruptions have been ongoing for about a month near the inter-Korean border and called on the regime to immediately halt all GPS disruption. “”North Korea needs to immediately halt its GPS disruption activities as it violates the armistice agreement and International Telecommunications Union regulations.” The disruptions could affect mobile phones, civilian planes and ships that rely on GPS for navigation. The Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning said on Friday that 58 civilian airplanes and 52 vessels were affected, but that no significant mishaps were reported. South Korea’s military says that the disruptive signals are coming from four different parts of the border including Haeju, and Mount Kumgang. The North possesses 10 different kinds of GPS jamming devices and conducted its first operation in 2012.
Todd Humphreys forecasts the near-future of geolocation when millimeter-accurate GPS “dots” will enable you to find pin-point locations, index-search your physical possessions … or to track people without their knowledge. And the response to the sinister side of this technology may have unintended consequences of its own. (Filmed at TEDxAustin.)
Demonstration of a Remote Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Hijacking via GPS Spoofing
Israeli presented Mini Harpy “killer” of the Russian S-300 and S-400
My best Bird’s Eye views of Israel made by drone in 2016
My favorite drone fails compilation!
Israel says GPS mysteriously disrupted in its airspace but planes secure
by Reuters
Wednesday, 26 June 2019 12:18 GMT
Israel is experiencing unexplained GPS disruptions in its airspace but measures are in place to allow safe landings and takeoffs at its main international airport, the government said on Wednesday.
The announcement by the Israel Airports Authority (IAA) followed a report on Tuesday by the International Federation of Air Line Pilots’ Associations (IFALPA) that “many” pilots had lost satellite signals from the Global Positioning System around Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport.
Confirming there had been GPS disruptions for approximately the past three weeks, an IAA statement said these affected only airborne crews and not terrestrial navigation systems.
Israeli authorities had worked from the outset to locate the source of the problem and fix it, it added.
Asked if an explanation for the disruption had been found, an IAA spokesman said: “No. I don’t know.”
Asked for comment, a spokeswoman for Israel’s Defence Ministry said only that the disruption was an IAA matter.
“At no stage has there been a safety incident stemming from the GPS disruption in the context of the precision of navigation and flight corridors,” the IAA said.
In its post on Tuesday, the IFALPA said the loss of the GPS signal may create numerous alerts for systems. (Writing by Dan Williams; Editing by Angus MacSwan)
Story 1: President Trump: “Iran made a very big mistake” — Option A: Strong Message and Done, Option B: One Missile Attack and Done, Option C: Total War With Iran and World Recession Due To Spike in Oil and Gas Prices — Videos —
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Was it all a bluff? After news leaked that President Donald Trump approved and then called off U.S. airstrikes on Iran last night, it emerged he’d warned Tehran about an imminent attack while insisting he was against a war.
Today, as airlines began re-routing flights away from the Strait of Hormuz, Iran’s Foreign Ministry called in the Swiss ambassador, who also represents U.S. interests, for talks.
Was the outreach why Trump abandoned the strikes? Or was this the latest example of the whipsaw approach from a president who’s twice attacked Syria but also backed away from using force after lashing out at Iran and North Korea?
The leak of Trump’s about-face also speaks volumes about the battle for influence in the White House. Hardliners clearly thought they’d convinced him to back a tough response to Iran’s downing of a U.S. Navy drone. Yet Trump was elected on a pledge to pull out of Middle East wars.
The president, who governs with the cliffhanger style of his Apprentice TV show, thrives on keeping supporters hooked on dramatic twists.
But as his 2020 re-election campaign gains steam, the stakes now include the prospect of armed conflict and instability in a region that supplies a third of the world’s oil.
Global Headlines
Biden’s burden | Democratic front-runner Joe Biden is encountering the same pitfalls as other seasoned politicians who’ve found their experience and record can be a liability. The former Delaware senator’s struggles to defend his remarks this week about finding common ground with two segregationists is an early sign of the trouble he could have explaining a complicated voting record and his nostalgia for a Washington collegiality that has steadily diminished since he was first elected in 1972.
Border control | Trump praised Mexico’s efforts to crack down on migrants crossing the border into the U.S. after the two countries entered an agreement aimed at stemming the flow of people entering Mexico from Central America. Mexico will take greater control of its southern border and ask foreigners to register their arrival.
Osaka drama | Before Trump, Group of 20 summits were dull if worthy affairs. This year’s gathering in Osaka, Japan next week promises to be anything but, as the U.S. president holds talks with China’s Xi Jinping after threatening to escalate their trade conflict. The best-case scenario would be a pause in new U.S. tariffs and a resumption of negotiations that broke down in May. The worst-case would be a new Cold War between the two largest economies.
Favorites flushed | European Union leaders cast aside the candidates who’ve dominated the race to head the next EU Commission and will start from scratch less than two weeks before a self-imposed deadline. The decision at a summit in Brussels extends gridlock that has left investors in the dark over a series of critical posts including the next president of the European Central Bank.
Bad air | As climate change tops political agendas from Washington to New Delhi, there’s no solution in sight for the bad air choking Europe’s poorest countries. While the EU has focused mostly on stability in the volatile Balkans, health problems and lost productivity from air pollution cost the continent more than 10 billion euros a year. Obsolete coal plants and cars spew smog and hundreds of thousands of people burn tires, wood and trash to stay warm.
What to Watch
Boris Johnson and Jeremy Hunt will go head-to-head in the contest to become the U.K.’s next prime minister as they seek votes from the Conservative Party’s 160,000 grassroots members over the next month. Ukraine’s Constitutional Court threw out a challenge to a decree by President Volodymyr Zelenskiy ordering early parliamentary elections. The ruling confirmed a vote will take place next month and a new government should be in place by the fall. Turkey reruns the election for mayor of Istanbul on Sunday, pitting former prime minister and ruling AK Party candidate Binali Yildirim against opposition challenger Ekrem Imamoglu, who was stripped of his narrow victory in the March 31 ballot.
And finally…The U.K. is poised to generate more energy from low-carbon sources than from fossil fuels for the first time since the Industrial Revolution. Wind, solar, hydro and nuclear plants provided 48% of the nation’s power in the first five months of this year. The U.K. has gone without burning coal, the dirtiest fossil fuel, for the equivalent of 80 days so far in 2019, including one stretch of 18 days in a row.
–With assistance from Kathleen Hunter and Daniel Ten Kate.
Trump says Iran made ‘big mistake’ by taking down US drone
By DEB RIECHMANNtoday
President Donald Trump speaks during a meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in the Oval Office of the White House, Thursday, June 20, 2019, in Washington. Trump declared Thursday that “Iran made a very big mistake” in shooting down a U.S. drone but suggested it was an accident rather than a strategic error. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump declared Thursday that “Iran made a very big mistake” by shooting down a U.S. surveillance drone over the Strait of Hormuz but suggested it was a foolish error rather than an intentional escalation of the tensions that have led to rising fears of open military conflict.
Asked about a U.S. response, the president said pointedly, “You’ll soon find out.”
The downing of the huge, unmanned aircraft , which Iran portrayed as a deliberate defense of its territory rather than a mistake, was a stark reminder of the risk of military conflict between U.S. and Iranian forces as the Trump administration combines a “maximum pressure” campaign of economic sanctions against Iran with a buildup of American forces in the region.
On Thursday, Iran called the sanctions “economic terrorism,” insisted the drone had invaded its airspace and said it was taking its case to the United Nations in an effort to prove the U.S. was lying about the aircraft being over international waters. It accused the U.S. of “a very dangerous and provocative act.”
The drone — which has a wingspan wider than a Boeing 737 — entered Iranian airspace “despite repeated radio warnings” and was shot down by Iran, acting under the U.N. Charter which allows self-defense action “if an armed attack occurs,” Iran’s U.N. Ambassador Majid Takht Ravanchi said in a letter to the U.N. secretary-general.
Trump, who has said he wants to avoid war and negotiate with Iran over its nuclear ambitions, appeared to play down the significance of the shootdown.
He cast it as “a new wrinkle … a new fly in the ointment.” Yet he also said that “this country will not stand for it, that I can tell you.”
Shortly before Trump spoke, Air Force Lt. Gen. Joseph Guastella, commander of U.S. Central Command air forces in the region, took a more pointed view of the shootdown in an area where Trump has blamed Iran for attacking shipping vessels.
“This attack is an attempt to disrupt our ability to monitor the area following recent threats to international shipping and free flow of commerce,” he said.
The Trump administration has been putting increasing economic pressure on Iran for more than a year. It reinstated punishing sanctions following Trump’s decision to pull the U.S. out of an international agreement intended to limit Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for relief from earlier sanctions.
The other world powers who remain signed on to the nuclear deal have set a meeting to discuss the U.S. withdrawal and Iran’s announced plans to increase its uranium stockpile for June 28, a date far enough in the future to perhaps allow tensions to cool.
Citing Iranian threats, the U.S. recently sent an aircraft carrier to the Persian Gulf region and deployed additional troops alongside the tens of thousands already there. All this has raised fears that a miscalculation or further rise in tensions could push the U.S. and Iran into an open conflict 40 years after Tehran’s Islamic Revolution.
“We do not have any intention for war with any country, but we are fully ready for war,” Revolutionary Guard commander Gen. Hossein Salami said in a televised address.
The paramilitary Guard, which answers only to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said it shot down the drone at 4:05 a.m. Thursday when it entered Iranian airspace near the Kouhmobarak district in southern Iran’s Hormozgan province. Kouhmobarak is about 1,200 kilometers (750 miles) southeast of Tehran.
The first U.S. reaction was Trump’s Thursday morning tweet of six forceful words: “Iran made a very big mistake.”
But later, while meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Trump said, “I would imagine it was a general or somebody that made a mistake in shooting that drone down.”
He said the American drone was unarmed and unmanned and “clearly over international waters.” It would have “made a big, big difference” if someone had been inside, he said.
“I find it hard to believe it was intentional, if you want to know the truth,” Trump said. “I think that it could have been somebody who was loose and stupid that did it.”
Taking issue with the U.S. version of where the attack occurred, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif tweeted that his country had retrieved sections of the military drone “in OUR territorial waters where it was shot down.” He said, “We don’t seek war but will zealously defend our skies, land & waters.”
U.S. Gen. Guastella disputed that contention, telling reporters that the aircraft was 34 kilometers (21 miles) from the nearest Iranian territory and flying at high altitude when struck by a surface-to-air missile. The U.S. military has not commented on the mission of the remotely piloted aircraft that can fly higher than 10 miles in altitude and stay in the air for over 24 hours at a time.
One U.S. official said there was a second American aircraft in the area that was able to get video and imagery of the drone when it was shot down.
Congressional leaders came to the White House for an hour-long briefing in the Situation Room late Thursday with top national security officials including Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, CIA Director Gina Haspel, Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Joseph Dunford acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan and Army Secretary Mark Esper, whom Trump has said he’ll nominate as Pentagon chief.
The Senate’s top Democrat called the downing of the American drone “deeply concerning” and accused the administration of not having an Iran strategy and keeping Congress and the rest of the nation in the dark.
“The president needs to explain to the American people why he’s driving us toward another endless conflict in the Middle East,” said Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she didn’t think Trump wanted war with Iran and the American people have “no appetite” for it either. She said the U.S. needs to be “strong and strategic” about protecting its interests but “cannot be reckless.”
Talking tougher, Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina called Iran a “murderous regime” and said, “If they’re itching for a fight they’re going to get one.”
“We’re a lot closer today than we were yesterday, and only God knows what tomorrow brings,” said Graham, a Trump ally who talked with the president by telephone.
The senator also focused on the issue of Iran’s nuclear ambitions, saying its leaders have refused to negotiate after Trump withdrew the U.S. from the international agreement to limit Iranian development of nuclear weapons.
Graham said it’s imperative that the U.S. clearly tell the Iranians that any attempt to increase uranium enrichment will be seen as a “hostile act against the United States and our allies in Israel and will not go unanswered.”
Another factor: This all comes as Trump is launching his re-election campaign. He ran for president promising to bring American troops home from the Middle East and Afghanistan and has repeatedly said he wants to keep America out of “endless wars.”
Ari Fleischer, who was press secretary for President George W. Bush, cautioned against thinking about politics when weighing any response to Iran.
“I suspect a successful limited counter-strike, such as taking out the missile battery that fired at the drone or the sinking of an unmanned Iranian vessel, would be seen as a well-calibrated show of resolve and discipline,” Fleischer said in an interview. He added that “if we do nothing, Iran may strike again thinking it has impunity.”
Iran shoots down US surveillance drone, heightening tensions
By NASSER KARIMI and JON GAMBRELL29 minutes ago
In this Oct. 24, 2018, photo released by the U.S. Air Force, members of the 7th Reconnaissance Squadron prepare to launch an RQ-4 Global Hawk at Naval Air Station Sigonella, Italy. Iran’s Revolutionary Guard shot down a U.S. RQ-4 Global Hawk on Thursday, June 20, 2019, amid heightened tensions between Tehran and Washington over its collapsing nuclear deal with world powers, American and Iranian officials said, though they disputed the circumstances of the incident. (Staff Sgt. Ramon A. Adelan/U.S. Air Force via AP)
TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iran’s Revolutionary Guard shot down a U.S. surveillance drone Thursday in the Strait of Hormuz, marking the first time the Islamic Republic directly attacked the American military amid tensions over Tehran’s unraveling nuclear deal with world powers.
The two countries disputed the circumstances leading up to an Iranian surface-to-air missile bringing down the U.S. Navy RQ-4A Global Hawk, an unmanned aircraft with a wingspan larger than a Boeing 737 jetliner and costing over $100 million.
Iran said the drone “violated” its territorial airspace, while the U.S. called the missile fire “an unprovoked attack” in international airspace over the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf and President Donald Trump tweeted that “Iran made a very big mistake!”
Trump later appeared to play down the incident, telling reporters in the Oval Office that he had a feeling that “a general or somebody” being “loose and stupid” made a mistake in shooting down the drone.
AP Graphic
The incident immediately heightened the crisis already gripping the wider region, which is rooted in Trump withdrawing the U.S. a year ago from Iran’s 2015 nuclear deal and imposing crippling new sanctions on Tehran. Recently, Iran quadrupled its production of low-enriched uranium to be on pace to break one of the deal’s terms by next week while threatening to raise enrichment closer to weapons-grade levels on July 7 if Europe doesn’t offer it a new deal.
Citing unspecified Iranian threats, the U.S. has sent an aircraft carrier to the Middle East and deployed additional troops alongside the tens of thousands already there. All this has raised fears that a miscalculation or further rise in tensions could push the U.S. and Iran into an open conflict 40 years after Tehran’s Islamic Revolution.
“We do not have any intention for war with any country, but we are fully ready for war,” Revolutionary Guard commander Gen. Hossein Salami said in a televised address.
The paramilitary Guard, which answers only to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said it shot down the drone at 4:05 a.m. Thursday when it entered Iranian airspace near the Kouhmobarak district in southern Iran’s Hormozgan province. Kouhmobarak is about 1,200 kilometers (750 miles) southeast of Tehran.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guard commander Gen. Hossein Salami. (Sepahnews via AP)
The drone took off from the southern Persian Gulf and collected data from Iranian territory, including the southern port of Chahbahar near Iran’s border with Pakistan, the Guard said in comments that appeared aimed at showing it could track the aircraft.
The U.S. military has not commented on the mission of the remotely piloted aircraft that can fly higher than 10 miles in altitude and stay in the air for over 24 hours at a time.
Iran used its air defense system known as Third of Khordad to shoot down the drone — a truck-based missile system that can fire up to 18 miles (30 kilometers) into the sky, the semi-official Fars news agency reported.
Iranian state TV later broadcast video it described as the moment the Guard launched the surface-to-air missile that struck the U.S. drone. Chants of “God is great!” could be heard as a fireball appeared in the darkened sky.
Typically, militaries worldwide call out to errant aircraft entering their airspace before firing. It’s unclear whether Iran gave any warning before opening fire. The U.S. military says Iran fired on and missed another drone last week near the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf through which 20% of all global oil moves.
The U.S. has been worried about international shipping through the strategic waterway since tankers were damaged in May and June in what Washington has blamed on limpet mines from Iran, although Tehran denied involvement.. On Wednesday in the United Arab Emirates, the U.S. Navy showed fragments of mines that it said bore “a striking resemblance” to those seen in Iran
The RQ-4 Global Hawk was at least 34 kilometers from Iranian territory when it was shot down by an Iranian surface-to-air missile, said Air Force Lt. Gen. Joseph Guastella, commander of the U.S. Central Command. He said it was an attempt to disrupt U.S. efforts to monitor the Persian Gulf region.
But Salami, speaking to a crowd in the western city of Sanandaj, described the American drone as “violating our national security border.”
“Borders are our red line,” the Revolutionary Guard general said. “Any enemy that violates the borders will be annihilated.”
Iran’s Foreign Ministry also said the drone entered Iranian airspace, and Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif tweeted it would take its case to the U.N. He later tweeted that Iran retrieved parts of the drone in its territorial waters.
Russian President Vladimir Putin urged caution, warning any war between Iran and the U.S. would be a “catastrophe for the region as a minimum.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu urged support for U.S. efforts to halt what he called escalating Iranian provocations.
“In the last 24 hours, Iran has intensified its aggression against the United States and against all of us,” he said.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres expressed concern and urged all parties to “avoid any action that could inflame the situation,” said U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric.
America stations some RQ-4 Global Hawks at the Al-Dhafra Air Base in the UAE, near the capital of Abu Dhabi. Associated Press journalists saw the drones on the base’s tarmac during a March 2016 visit by then-Vice President Joe Biden. The U.S. military occasionally publishes images from there of the drones, which have a distinctive hump-shaped front and an engine atop the fuselage.
Iran has claimed to have shot down U.S. drones before. In the most famous incident, in December 2011, Iran seized an RQ-170 Sentinel flown by the CIA to monitor Iranian nuclear sites after it entered Iranian airspace from neighboring Afghanistan. Iran later reverse-engineered the drone to create their own variants.
Elsewhere in the region Thursday, Saudi Arabia said Yemen’s Iranian-backed Houthi rebels fired a rocket at a desalination plant in al-Shuqaiq, a city in the kingdom’s Jizan province. The state-run Saudi Press Agency quoted military spokesman Col. Turki al-Maliki as saying it caused no damage or casualties.
The Yemeni rebel Al-Masirah satellite news channel earlier said the Houthis targeted a power plant in Jizan, near the kingdom’s border with Yemen, with a cruise missile.
A coalition led by Saudi Arabia, a key U.S. ally, has been battling the Houthis since March 2015 in Yemen, the Arab world’s poorest nation now pushed to the brink of famine by the conflict. In recent weeks, the Houthis have launched a new campaign sending missiles and bomb-laden drones into Saudi Arabia.
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S&P 500 closes at new record as Wall Street bets Fed will lower rates, Dow surges nearly 250 points
The S&P 500 just closed at a record high — Here’s what four experts say to watch
Stocks rallied on Thursday, led by strong gains in tech and energy shares, as Wall Street cheered the possibility that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates next month.
The S&P 500 surged 1% to 2,954.18, a record close. The broad index also hit an intraday record of 2,958.06. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed 249.17 points higher at 26,753.17. The Nasdaq Composite gained 0.8% to end the day at 8,051.34.
The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell below 2% for the first time since November 2016. Investors cheered the decline in the benchmark for mortgage rates and corporate bonds.
The energy sector rose more than 2% to lead all 11 S&P 500 sectors higher as oil prices jumped. Tech gained 1.4% after shares of Oracle surged more than 8% on stronger-than-forecast earnings. General Electric’s 2.8% rise pushed the industrials sector up more than 1.6% on the day.
“Markets are based on numbers and perception. If the perception is rates are getting cut, that’s going to drive markets higher,” said Kathy Entwistle, senior vice president of wealth management at UBS. “UBS’ stance up until yesterday was we wouldn’t see any rate cuts this year. Now we see a much larger chance of a 50-basis-point cut.”
The Fed said Wednesday it stands ready to battle growing global and domestic economic risks as they took stock of intensifying trade tensions and growing concerns about inflation. Most Fed policymakers slashed their rate outlook for the rest of the calendar year by approximately half a percentage point in the previous session, while Chairman Jerome Powell said others agree the case for lower rates is building.
Policymakers also dropped “patient” from the Fed’s statement and acknowledged that inflation is “running below” its 2% objective.
Market participants viewed the overall tone from the U.S. central bank as more dovish than expected. Traders are now pricing in a 100% chance of a rate cutnext month, according to the CME FedWatch tool.
With Thursday’s gains, the market has now erased the steep losses recorded by the major indexes in May, which were sparked by trade fears. The S&P 500 and Dow both fell more than 6% while the Nasdaq lost 7.9% last month. The three indexes were up more than 7% for June.
China and the U.S. hiked tariffs on billions of dollars worth of their goods in May. Stocks turned around this month as traders bet the rising trade tensions, coupled with weaker economic data, would lead the Fed to ease its monetary policy stance.
The Fed’s message on Wednesday sent the 10-year Treasury yield to as low as 1.974% before ending the day around 2.02%. The yield stood at 2.8% in January.
“The FOMC reinforced the market’s conviction,” said Steve Blitz, chief U.S. economist at TS Lombard, in a note. “Barring a dramatic turnaround in the data, the next move is a cut – perhaps even a 50bp reduction.”
The dollar also took a hit against other major currencies. The dollar index dropped 0.5% to 96.65, led by a 0.6% slide in the euro. The yen and Canadian dollar also rose against the U.S. currency.
Energy shares got a boost from higher oil prices. The Energy Select Sector SPDR Fund (XLE) climbed 2.2% as shares of Exxon Mobil gained 1.7%. Oil prices surged 5.4% after a U.S. official said a drone was shot down over Iranian airspace.
Meanwhile, Slack shares surged more than 40% in their first day of trading. The stock closed above $38 after setting a reference price of $26.
The term “monetary policy” refers to the actions undertaken by a central bank, such as the Federal Reserve, to influence the availability and cost of money and credit to help promote national economic goals. The Federal Reserve Act of 1913 gave the Federal Reserve responsibility for setting monetary policy.
The Federal Reserve controls the three tools of monetary policy–open market operations, the discount rate, and reserve requirements. The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System is responsible for the discount rate and reserve requirements, and the Federal Open Market Committee is responsible for open market operations. Using the three tools, the Federal Reserve influences the demand for, and supply of, balances that depository institutions hold at Federal Reserve Banks and in this way alters the federal funds rate. The federal funds rate is the interest rate at which depository institutions lend balances at the Federal Reserve to other depository institutions overnight.
Changes in the federal funds rate trigger a chain of events that affect other short-term interest rates, foreign exchange rates, long-term interest rates, the amount of money and credit, and, ultimately, a range of economic variables, including employment, output, and prices of goods and services.
Structure of the FOMC
The Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) consists of twelve members–the seven members of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System; the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York; and four of the remaining eleven Reserve Bank presidents, who serve one-year terms on a rotating basis. The rotating seats are filled from the following four groups of Banks, one Bank president from each group: Boston, Philadelphia, and Richmond; Cleveland and Chicago; Atlanta, St. Louis, and Dallas; and Minneapolis, Kansas City, and San Francisco. Nonvoting Reserve Bank presidents attend the meetings of the Committee, participate in the discussions, and contribute to the Committee’s assessment of the economy and policy options.
The FOMC holds eight regularly scheduled meetings per year. At these meetings, the Committee reviews economic and financial conditions, determines the appropriate stance of monetary policy, and assesses the risks to its long-run goals of price stability and sustainable economic growth.
The Federal Open Market Committee votes 9-1 to keep the benchmark rate in a target range of 2.25% to 2.5%.
The action sets up a possible confrontation between Fed Chairman Jerome Powell and President Donald Trump, who has been pressuring the Fed to cut rates.
The Fed drops the word “patient” in describing its approach to policy.
The central bank also leaves the door open somewhat to future cuts.
Eight members favor one cut this year, while the same number votes in favor of the status quo and one still wants a rate hike. Powell says in a press conference some officials believe the case for accommodation has “strengthened.”
A divided Federal Reserve held the line on interest rates Wednesday and indicated formally that no cuts are coming in 2019. The decision came amid divisions over what is ahead and still leaves open the possibility that policy loosening could happen before the end of the year depending on how conditions unfold.
The central bank predicts one or two rate cuts in its set of economic predictions, but not until 2020. Despite cautious wording in the post-meeting statement Wednesday, markets are still betting the Fed cuts, as soon as July.
In a decision closely watched by financial market participants clamoring for multiple cuts, central bank officials on the Federal Open Market Committee voted 9-1 to keep the benchmark rate in a target range of 2.25% to 2.5%, where it has been since December’s controversial quarter-point increase. St. Louis Fed President James Bullard voted to reduce the rate.
The action sets up a possible confrontation between Fed Chairman Jerome Powell and President Donald Trump, who has been pressuring the Fed to cut rates. Just Tuesday, Trump said “let’s see what he does” at the Fed meeting when asked if he still wants to demote Powell.
At the post-statement news conference, Powell was asked about his future as chairman. “I think the law is clear that I have a four year term, and I fully intend to serve it,” he said.
The strong majority for this month’s decision contrasted with a sharp difference of opinion on what happens next.
The committee provided an important nod to those worried about slower growth: It dropped the word “patient” in describing its approach to policy. The characterization was a key part of the Fed “pivot” earlier this year that signaled to the market a more dovish approach to rates.
“The Fed didn’t surprise investors with the decision to maintain rates, but the split vote tells us that a cut is on the way and it’s increasingly likely that will be in July, as bond markets have been hoping,” said Neil Birrell, chief investment officer at Premier Asset Management.
“This was probably the compromise decision — it wasn’t shocking and should offer some reassurance,” Steve Rick, chief economist at CUNA Mutual Group, said in a note. “The FOMC will still want to closely monitor the stress fractures from the bond market, middling housing and auto sales numbers, and an increasingly uncertain global economic landscape in the coming months.”
The statement also changed wording to concede that inflation is “running below” the Fed’s 2% objective. In their forecast for headline inflation this year, officials slashed the estimate to 1.5% from March’s 1.8%. Core inflation, which excludes volatile food and energy prices, is likely now to be 1.8% from March’s 2%, according to the quarterly summary of economic projections also released Wednesday.
‘In light of these uncertainties’
The committee changed language from its May statement to indicate that economic activity is “rising at a moderate rate,” a downgrade from “solid.”
In their baseline scenario, FOMC members said they still expect “sustained expansion of economic activity” and a move toward 2% inflation, but realize that “uncertainties about this outlook have increased.”
“In light of these uncertainties and muted inflation pressures, the Committee will closely monitor the implications of incoming information for the economic outlook and will act as appropriate to sustain the expansion, with a strong labor market and inflation near its symmetric 2 percent objective,” the statement said. The “act as appropriate to sustain the expansion” language mirrors a statement from Powell in early June.
Very reasonable to think Fed will cut rates twice this year: Strategist
The committee characterized the labor market as “strong” with “solid” jobs growth, despite May’s disappointing nonfarm payrolls growth of 75,000. The statement further said that household spending “appears to have picked up from earlier in the year.”
The changes came amid what appeared to be little consensus among the committee about where rates go next.
Divided Fed
According to the “dot plot” of individual members’ expectations, eight members favor one cut this year while the same number voted in favor of the status quo and one still wants a rate hike. Bullard and Minneapolis Fed President Neel Kashkari have led the public discussion about the potential for rate cuts, while other members have been less firm.
Into 2020, the Fed consensus was a bit stronger, with nine members wanting a cut to a funds rate around 2.1%. The direction changes, though, in 2021, with indications of an increase of about a quarter-point, culminating in an expected long-run value of 2.5%. The funds rate most recently was trading at 2.37%.
Traders in the thin and volatile funds market had been pricing in a 26% chance of a cut at this week’s meeting. Later in the year, though, the probability for a July easing rose to 82.5% and the chances of a second cut in December were most recently at 60.4%. The market expects a third cut to come around March of 2020.
While the statement language offered some significant changes, estimates in the summary of economic projections, other than inflation, moved little from March. GDP growth is still expected to be 2.1% for the year – it was 3.1% in the first quarter, and the Atlanta Fed is forecasting a 2% gain in the second quarter. The unemployment rate is now expected to hold at a 50-year low of 3.6%, against the March forecast of 3.7%.
The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note fell below 2% for the first time since November 2016 on Wednesday — breaching a key psychological level.
The policymaking committee of the Fed also dropped the word “patient” from its statement, a sign interpreted by some investors as a hint that the central bank hasn’t abandoned the idea of a rate cut in 2019.
A chart showing U.S. 10-year treasury yield below 2% as of 8:52 p.m. ET Wednesday.
CNBC
The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note fell below 2% for the first time since November 2016 on Wednesday — breaching a key psychological level — after the Federal Reserve struck a more dovish tone in its June policy statement and Chair Jerome Powell said that the case for easier monetary policy had strengthened.
Though the central bank maintained the target overnight lending rate, that decision was accompanied by a growing number of officials open to one rate cut by the end of 2019 with eight members in favor. However, the consensus still didn’t expect a reduction until 2020 at the earliest.
The policymaking committee of the Fed also dropped the word “patient” from its statement, a sign interpreted by some investors as a hint that the central bank hasn’t abandoned the idea of a rate cut in 2019. The Fed tweaked its statement to acknowledge that inflation is “running below” its 2% objective.
At around 8:28 p.m. ET, the yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note, which moves inversely to price, declined below 2% to around 1.992% — its lowest level since November 2016. The yield on the 2-year slipped to 1.7168%, its lowest level since 2017. The 3-month Treasury bill yield ticked lower to 2.175%, as of 7:30 p.m. ET.
While stock investors and home buyers may initially cheer the drop in the benchmark for corporate bond and mortgage rates, the return to levels not seen in more than two years raises serious questions about the state of the economy.
Softer economic gauges like May’s anemic jobs report — which showed that the U.S. economy added just 75,000 positions — and a lackluster consumer pricing print suggested to economists and fixed-income traders earlier this month that the central bank may have to assure markets of its willingness to step in if GDP growth decelerates.
Speaking to reporters after the central bank meeting, Powell said policymakers are worried about certain economic data and see an improving case for easier policy.
“Overall, our policy discussion focused on the appropriate response to the uncertain environment,” he said. “Many participants now see the case for somewhat more accommodative policy has strengthened,” Powell said.
Traders are now pricing in a more than 80% chance of a rate cut in July and 70% probability of another reduction in September, according to the CME Group’s FedWatch tool.
“It was largely what the market was looking for: I don’t think they went too far as to spook the market in any way,” said Tom Garretson, a fixed-income strategist at RBC. “Seeing that eight [officials] are seeing a rate cut this year was dovish.”
“This is mostly an inflation story,” he added. “If you look at GDP forecast for 2020 they’re up to 2% from 1.9% … even if they were worried about tariffs, it didn’t show up in their forecast.”
The Fed has in recent months been grappling with a consistent shortfall in inflation relative to its self-imposed 2% target. The Fed’s preferred inflation gauge, the core personal consumption expenditures (PCE) price index, increased 1.6% in the year to April after gaining 1.5% in March.
Treasury inflation-protected securities — bonds whose payouts are indexed to consumer prices — show that price growth expectations have slid in recent months. Inflation is a threat to the value of a bond’s fixed coupon and principal payments.
Wednesday’s decision from the Federal Open Market Committee came after President Donald Trump’s repeated criticism of the Fed and Jerome Powell specifically for raising rates and tightening monetary conditions over the last year. Trump, who sees recent Fed policy as damaging to American marketsand undermining his bargaining position in trade talks, has broken with tradition in his frequent and vocal criticism of the central bank.
Asked Tuesday whether he wants to remove Powell as Fed Chair, Trump said “Let’s see what he does.” Trump’s comments came after Bloomberg News reported Tuesday morning that the White House had looked into demoting Powell in February.
Trump also said Tuesday he will be having an “extended meeting” next week with the Chinese leader Xi Jinping at the G-20 meeting in Japan.
Meanwhile, European Central Bank President Mario Draghi said Tuesday that the central bank may need to ease monetary policy in the coming months if inflation doesn’t bounce back toward its target.
“In the absence of improvement, such that the sustained return of inflation to our aim is threatened, additional stimulus will be required,” Draghi said.
— CNBC’s Eustance Huang and Jeff Cox contributed reporting.
The interest rate that the borrowing bank pays to the lending bank to borrow the funds is negotiated between the two banks, and the weighted average of this rate across all such transactions is the federal funds effective rate.
The federal funds target rate is determined by a meeting of the members of the Federal Open Market Committee which normally occurs eight times a year about seven weeks apart. The committee may also hold additional meetings and implement target rate changes outside of its normal schedule.
The Federal Reserve uses open market operations to make the federal funds effective rate follow the federal funds target rate. The target rate is chosen in part to influence the money supply in the U.S. economy[3]
Contents
Mechanism
Financial institutions are obligated by law to maintain certain levels of reserves, either as reserves with the Fed or as vault cash. The level of these reserves is determined by the outstanding assets and liabilities of each depository institution, as well as by the Fed itself, but is typically 10%[4] of the total value of the bank’s demand accounts (depending on bank size). In the range of $9.3 million to $43.9 million, for transaction deposits (checking accounts, NOWs, and other deposits that can be used to make payments) the reserve requirement in 2007–2008 was 3 percent of the end-of-the-day daily average amount held over a two-week period. Transaction deposits over $43.9 million held at the same depository institution carried a 10 percent reserve requirement.
For example, assume a particular U.S. depository institution, in the normal course of business, issues a loan. This dispenses money and decreases the ratio of bank reserves to money loaned. If its reserve ratio drops below the legally required minimum, it must add to its reserves to remain compliant with Federal Reserve regulations. The bank can borrow the requisite funds from another bank that has a surplus in its account with the Fed. The interest rate that the borrowing bank pays to the lending bank to borrow the funds is negotiated between the two banks, and the weighted average of this rate across all such transactions is the federal funds effective rate.
The federal funds target rate is set by the governors of the Federal Reserve, which they enforce by open market operations and adjustments in the interest rate on reserves.[5] The target rate is almost always what is meant by the media referring to the Federal Reserve “changing interest rates.” The actual federal funds rate generally lies within a range of that target rate, as the Federal Reserve cannot set an exact value through open market operations.
Another way banks can borrow funds to keep up their required reserves is by taking a loan from the Federal Reserve itself at the discount window. These loans are subject to audit by the Fed, and the discount rate is usually higher than the federal funds rate. Confusion between these two kinds of loans often leads to confusion between the federal funds rate and the discount rate. Another difference is that while the Fed cannot set an exact federal funds rate, it does set the specific discount rate.
The federal funds rate target is decided by the governors at Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meetings. The FOMC members will either increase, decrease, or leave the rate unchanged depending on the meeting’s agenda and the economic conditions of the U.S. It is possible to infer the market expectations of the FOMC decisions at future meetings from the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) Fed Funds futures contracts, and these probabilities are widely reported in the financial media.
Applications
Interbank borrowing is essentially a way for banks to quickly raise money. For example, a bank may want to finance a major industrial effort but may not have the time to wait for deposits or interest (on loan payments) to come in. In such cases the bank will quickly raise this amount from other banks at an interest rate equal to or higher than the Federal funds rate.
Raising the federal funds rate will dissuade banks from taking out such inter-bank loans, which in turn will make cash that much harder to procure. Conversely, dropping the interest rates will encourage banks to borrow money and therefore invest more freely.[6] This interest rate is used as a regulatory tool to control how freely the U.S. economy operates.
By setting a higher discount rate the Federal Bank discourages banks from requisitioning funds from the Federal Bank, yet positions itself as a lender of last resort.
Comparison with LIBOR
Though the London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR) and the federal funds rate are concerned with the same action, i.e. interbank loans, they are distinct from one another, as follows:
The target federal funds rate is a target interest rate that is set by the FOMC for implementing U.S. monetary policies.
The (effective) federal funds rate is achieved through open market operations at the Domestic Trading Desk at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York which deals primarily in domestic securities (U.S. Treasury and federal agencies’ securities).[7]
LIBOR is based on a questionnaire where a selection of banks guess the rates at which they could borrow money from other banks.
LIBOR may or may not be used to derive business terms. It is not fixed beforehand and is not meant to have macroeconomic ramifications.[8]
Predictions by the market
Considering the wide impact a change in the federal funds rate can have on the value of the dollar and the amount of lending going to new economic activity, the Federal Reserve is closely watched by the market. The prices of Option contracts on fed funds futures (traded on the Chicago Board of Trade) can be used to infer the market’s expectations of future Fed policy changes. Based on CME Group 30-Day Fed Fund futures prices, which have long been used to express the market’s views on the likelihood of changes in U.S. monetary policy, the CME Group FedWatch tool allows market participants to view the probability of an upcoming Fed Rate hike. One set of such implied probabilities is published by the Cleveland Fed.
As of 19 December 2018 the target range for the Federal Funds Rate is 2.25–2.50%.[9] This represents the ninth increase in the target rate since tightening began in December 2015.[10]
The last full cycle of rate increases occurred between June 2004 and June 2006 as rates steadily rose from 1.00% to 5.25%. The target rate remained at 5.25% for over a year, until the Federal Reserve began lowering rates in September 2007. The last cycle of easing monetary policy through the rate was conducted from September 2007 to December 2008 as the target rate fell from 5.25% to a range of 0.00–0.25%. Between December 2008 and December 2015 the target rate remained at 0.00–0.25%, the lowest rate in the Federal Reserve’s history, as a reaction to the Financial crisis of 2007–2008 and its aftermath. According to Jack A. Ablin, chief investment officer at Harris Private Bank, one reason for this unprecedented move of having a range, rather than a specific rate, was because a rate of 0% could have had problematic implications for money market funds, whose fees could then outpace yields.[11]
Explanation of federal funds rate decisions
When the Federal Open Market Committee wishes to reduce interest rates they will increase the supply of money by buying government securities. When additional supply is added and everything else remains constant, the price of borrowed funds – the federal funds rate – falls. Conversely, when the Committee wishes to increase the federal funds rate, they will instruct the Desk Manager to sell government securities, thereby taking the money they earn on the proceeds of those sales out of circulation and reducing the money supply. When supply is taken away and everything else remains constant, the interest rate will normally rise.[12]
The Federal Reserve has responded to a potential slow-down by lowering the target federal funds rate during recessions and other periods of lower growth. In fact, the Committee’s lowering has recently predated recessions,[13] in order to stimulate the economy and cushion the fall. Reducing the federal funds rate makes money cheaper, allowing an influx of credit into the economy through all types of loans.
The charts linked below show the relation between S&P 500 and interest rates.
Bill Gross of PIMCO suggested that in the prior 15 years ending in 2007, in each instance where the fed funds rate was higher than the nominal GDP growth rate, assets such as stocks and housing fell.[32]
International effects
A low federal funds rate makes investments in developing countries such as China or Mexico more attractive. A high federal funds rate makes investments outside the United States less attractive. The long period of a very low federal funds rate from 2009 forward resulted in an increase in investment in developing countries. As the United States began to return to a higher rate in 2013 investments in the United States became more attractive and the rate of investment in developing countries began to fall. The rate also affects the value of currency, a higher rate increasing the value of the U.S. dollar and decreasing the value of currencies such as the Mexican peso.[33]
^Peter S. Goodman, Keith Bradsher and Neil Gough (March 16, 2017). “The Fed Acts. Workers in Mexico and Merchants in Malaysia Suffer”. The New York Times. Retrieved March 18,2017. Rising interest rates in the United States are driving money out of many developing countries, straining governments and pinching consumers around the globe.
The term yield curve refers to the relationship between the short- and long-term interest rates of fixed-income securities issued by the U.S. Treasury. An inverted yield curve occurs when short-term interest rates exceed long-term rates.
From an economic perspective, an inverted yield curve is a noteworthy event. Below, we explain this rare phenomenon, discuss its impact on consumers and investors, and tell you how to adjust your portfolio to account for it.
Interest Rates and Yield Curves
Typically, short-term interest rates are lower than long-term rates, so the yield curve slopes upwards, reflecting higher yields for longer-term investments. This is referred to as a normal yield curve. When the spread between short-term and long-term interest rates narrows, the yield curve begins to flatten. A flat yield curve is often seen during the transition from a normal yield curve to an inverted one.
Figure 1 – A normal yield curve
What Does an Inverted Yield Curve Suggest?
Historically, an inverted yield curve has been viewed as an indicator of a pending economic recession. When short-term interest rates exceed long-term rates, market sentiment suggests that the long-term outlook is poor and that the yields offered by long-term fixed income will continue to fall.
More recently, this viewpoint has been called into question, as foreign purchases of securities issued by the U.S. Treasury have created a high and sustained level of demand for products backed by U.S. government debt. When investors are aggressively seeking debt instruments, the debtor can offer lower interest rates. When this occurs, many argue that it is the laws of supply and demand, rather than impending economic doom and gloom, that enable lenders to attract buyers without having to pay higher interest rates.
Figure 2 – An inverted yield curve: note the inverse relationship between yield and maturity
Inverted yield curves have been relatively rare, due in large part to longer-than-average periods between recessions since the early 1990s. For example, the economic expansions that began in March 1991, November 2001 and June 2009 were three of the four longest economic expansions since World War II. During these long periods, the question often arises as to whether an inverted yield curve can happen again.
Economic cycles, regardless of their length, have historically transitioned from growth to recession and back again. Inverted yield curves are an essential element of these cycles, preceding every recession since 1956. Considering the consistency of this pattern, an inverted yield will likely form again if the current expansion fades to recession.
Upward sloping yield curves are a natural extension of the higher risks associated with long maturities. In a growing economy, investors also demand higher yields at the long end of the curve to compensate for the opportunity cost of investing in bonds versus other asset classes, and to maintain an acceptable spread over inflation rates.
As the economic cycle begins to slow, perhaps due to interest rate hikes by the Federal Reserve Bank, the upward slope of the yield curve tends to flatten as short-term rates increase and longer yields stay stable or decline slightly. In this environment, investors see long-term yields as an acceptable substitute for the potential of lower returns in equities and other asset classes, which tend to increase bond prices and reduce yields.
Inverted Yield Curve Impact on Consumers
In addition to its impact on investors, an inverted yield curve also has an impact on consumers. For example, homebuyers financing their properties with adjustable-rate mortgages (ARMs) have interest-rate schedules that are periodically updated based on short-term interest rates. When short-term rates are higher than long-term rates, payments on ARMs tend to rise. When this occurs, fixed-rate loans may be more attractive than adjustable-rate loans.
Lines of credit are affected in a similar manner. In both cases, consumers must dedicate a larger portion of their incomes toward servicing existing debt. This reduces expendable income and has a negative effect on the economy as a whole.
The Formation of an Inverted Yield Curve
As concerns of an impending recession increase, investors tend to buy long Treasury bonds based on the premise that they offer a safe harbor from falling equities markets, provide preservation of capital and have potential for appreciation in value as interest rates decline. As a result of the rotation to long maturities, yields can fall below short-term rates, forming an inverted yield curve. Since 1956, equities have peaked six times after the start of an inversion, and the economy has fallen into recession within seven to 24 months.
As of 2017, the most recent inverted yield curve first appeared in August 2006, as the Fed raised short-term interest rates in response to overheating equity, real estate and mortgage markets. The inversion of the yield curve preceded the peak of the Standard & Poor’s 500 in October 2007 by 14 months and the official start of the recession in December 2007 by 16 months. However, a growing number of 2018 economic outlooks from investment firms are suggesting that an inverted yield curve could be on the horizon, citing the narrowing spread between short- and long-dated Treasuries.
If history is any precedent, the current business cycle will progress, and slowing in the economy may eventually become evident. If concerns of the next recession rise to the point where investors see the purchase of long-dated Treasuries as the best option for their portfolios, there is a high likelihood that the next inverted yield curve will take shape.
Inverted Yield Curve Impact on Fixed-Income Investors
A yield curve inversion has the greatest impact on fixed-income investors. In normal circumstances, long-term investments have higher yields; because investors are risking their money for longer periods of time, they are rewarded with higher payouts. An inverted curve eliminates the risk premium for long-term investments, allowing investors to get better returns with short-term investments.
When the spread between U.S. Treasuries (a risk-free investment) and higher-risk corporate alternatives is at historical lows, it is often an easy decision to invest in lower-risk vehicles. In such cases, purchasing a Treasury-backed security provides a yield similar to the yield on junk bonds, corporate bonds, real estate investment trusts (REITs) and other debt instruments, but without the risk inherent in these vehicles. Money market funds and certificates of deposit (CDs) may also be attractive – particularly when a one-year CD is paying yields comparable to those on a 10-year Treasury bond.
Inverted Yield Curve Impact on Equity Investors
When the yield curve becomes inverted, profit margins fall for companies that borrow cash at short-term rates and lend at long-term rates, such as community banks. Likewise, hedge funds are often forced to take on increased risk in order to achieve their desired level of returns.
In fact, a bad bet on Russian interest rates is largely credited for the demise of Long-Term Capital Management, a well-known hedge fund run by bond trader John Meriwether.
Despite their consequences for some parties, yield-curve inversions tend to have less impact on consumer staples and healthcare companies, which are not interest-rate dependent. This relationship becomes clear when an inverted yield curve precedes a recession. When this occurs, investors tend to turn to defensive stocks, such as those in the food, oil and tobacco industries, which are often less affected by downturns in the economy.
The Bottom Line
While experts question whether or not an inverted yield curve remains a strong indicator of pending economic recession, keep in mind that history is littered with portfolios that were devastated when investors blindly followed predictions about how “it’s different this time.” Most recently, shortsighted equity investors spouting this mantra participated in the “tech wreck,” snapping up shares in tech companies at inflated prices even though these firms had no hope of ever making a profit.
If you want to be a smart investor, ignore the noise. Instead of spending time and effort trying to figure out what the future will bring, construct your portfolio based on long-term thinking and long-term convictions – not short-term market movements.
For your short-term income needs, do the obvious: choose the investment with the highest yield, but keep in mind that inversions are an anomaly and they don’t last forever. When the inversion ends, adjust your portfolio accordingly.
Story 3: Creepy, Sleepy, Dopey, Joey Biden in Praise of Civility of Democrat Segregationist Senators Eastland (Mississippi) and Talmadge (Georgia) Who Got Things Done — Radical Extremist Democrats (REDS) Attack Biden — Lying Lunatic Leftist Losers and Big Lie Media Playing Identity Politics and Divide and Conquer — Videos —
Biden’s ties to segregationist senator spark campaign tension
by Matt Viser and Annie Linskey, Washington Post,Updated: June 20, 2019- 10:59 PM
SUSAN WALSH / AP
Joe Biden was a freshman senator, the youngest member of the august body, when he reached out to an older colleague for help on one of his early legislative proposals: The courts were ordering racially segregated school districts to bus children to create more integrated classrooms, a practice Biden opposed and wanted to change.
“I want you to know that I very much appreciate your help during this week’s Committee meeting in attemptingto bring my antibusing legislation to a vote,” Biden wrote on June 30, 1977.
The recipient of Biden’s entreaty was Sen. James Eastland, at the time a well-known segregationist who had called blacks “an inferior race” and once vowed to prevent blacks and whites from eating together in Washington. The exchange, revealed in a series of letters, offers a new glimpse into an old relationship that erupted this week as a major controversy for Biden’s presidential campaign.Biden on Wednesday night described his relationship with Eastland as one he “had to put up with.” He said of his relationships with Eastland and another staunch segregationist and southern Democrat, Sen. Herman Talmadge of Georgia, that “the fact of the matter is that we were able to do it because we were able to win — we were able to beat them on everything they stood for.”
But the letters show a different type of relationship, one in which they were aligned on a legislative issue. Biden said at the time that he did not think that busing was the best way to integrate schools in Delaware and that systemic racism should be dealt with by investing in schools and improving housing policies.
The letters were provided Thursday to the Washington Post by the University of Mississippi, which houses Eastland’s archived papers. They were reported in April by CNN.
Biden’s campaign late Thursday issued a statement saying that “the insinuation that Joe Biden shared the same views as Eastland on segregation is a lie.”
“Plain and simple. Joe Biden has dedicated his career to fighting for civil rights,” the statement said.
The controversy over Biden’s comments this week have continued to reverberate at a crucial time in the campaign, with matters of race dominating the political discussion ahead of several prominent gatherings, including the first presidential debate next week and a multicandidate event before black voters in South Carolina on Friday. It has emerged as a complex political problem for Biden, who has been trying to campaign as a civil rights champion while explaining past views that are out of step with today’s Democratic base.
Biden’s Wednesday remarks sparked one of the sharpest intra-Democrat exchanges of the campaign, when Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey, one of his black 2020 rivals, criticized both Biden’s work with segregationists and the language that he used in describing it.
On Wednesday, Biden called Booker. Biden’s campaign also distributed talking points to supporters, emphasizing that Eastland and Talmadge “were people who he fundamentally disagreed with on the issue of civil rights.”
Late Thursday, the former vice president met with a small group that included black members of Congress, one of the participants said.
Divisions also emerged in Biden’s campaign over how he should handle such situations. Aides alternately argued that he simply misspoke in telling the anecdote, that he shouldn’t be telling it at all or that his remarks demonstrate his ability to work with those with whom he disagrees and the words were being purposefully twisted for political gain.
The letters show that Biden’s courtship of Eastland started in 1972, before he had taken office, and that he wrote to the older senator listing his top six committee assignment requests, with Foreign Relations and Judiciary at the top. A few weeks later, Biden thanked Eastland, writing that he was “flattered and grateful” for his help. He also referred to the December 1972 car crash that killed his wife and daughter and injured his two sons.
“Despite my preoccupation with family matters at this time, I intend to place the highest priority on attending to my committee responsibilities,” Biden wrote.
Biden supporters have repeatedly pointed to his efforts on civil rights issues to cast him as a champion of equality. Not only did he share an eight-year partnership with the first black president, he also worked alongside black leaders throughout his career on extending the Voting Rights Act, amending the Fair Housing Act and creating the holiday honoring the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.et in the debate over the merits of busing as a solution to greater integration, Biden’s avowed stance against it put him at odds with some civil rights leaders.
It was in that context that he courted the support of Eastland — at the time the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee — as well as other senators.
In one letter, on March 2, 1977, Biden outlined legislation he was filing to restrict busing practices.
“My bill strikes at the heart of the injustice of court ordered busing,” he wrote to Eastland. “It prohibits the federal courts from disrupting our educational system in the name of the constitution where there is no evidence that the governmental officials intended to discriminate.”
“I believe there is growing sentiment in the Congress to curb unnecessary busing,” he added. The Senate two years earlier had passed a Biden amendment that prohibited the federal Department of Health, Education and Welfare from ordering busing to achieve school integration.
“That was the first time the U.S. Senate took a firm stand in opposition to busing,” Biden wrote. “The Supreme Court seems to have recognized that busing simply cannot be justified in cases where state and local officials intended no discrimination.”
In later letters to Eastland, Biden continued pushing his legislation.
“I want you to know that I very much appreciate your help during this week’s Committee meeting in attempting to bring my antibusing legislation to a vote,” Biden wrote on June 30, 1977.
The next year, he continued to push for antibusing legislation and again wrote to Eastland.
“Since your support was essential to having our bill reported out by the Judiciary Committee, I want to personally ask your continued support and alert you to our intentions,” Biden wrote on Aug 22, 1978. “Your participation in floor debate would be welcomed.”
After Biden’s remarks at the Wednesday night fund-raiser, advisers played down his comments about Eastland as a garbled rendition of a familiar Biden anecdote. In particular, they sought to excuse Biden for saying that Eastland didn’t refer to him as “boy” — an insult leveled at black men — but as “son.”
“He just misspoke,” said one Biden adviser. “The way Biden usually tells the story, he says Eastland didn’t call him ‘senator,’ he called him ‘son,’ ” the adviser said. “Eastland called him ‘boy’ and ‘son’ also. This was Eastland’s way of diminishing young senators.”
In the campaign statement Thursday, Biden’s national press secretary, Jamal Brown, said Biden’s “strong support for equal housing, equal education and equal job opportunities were clear to all Delawareans in the 1970s.”
Biden sought to ensure that black students received “the resources necessary to deliver the quality education they deserved,” he said.
Brown added that throughout his public life, Biden “fought the institutional problems that created de facto segregated school systems and neighborhoods in the first place: redlining, school lines drawn to keep races and classes separate and housing patterns and discrimination.”
Almost the entire Democratic field is set to attend a fish fry Friday night hosted by House Majority Whip James Clyburn, a leading black figure in the state and one who has remained supportive of Biden.
It would be the first public appearance Biden is making with the same Democratic presidential hopefuls who have heaped criticism on him for the comment.
In demanding an apology, Booker said Wednesday that Biden’s “relationships with proud segregationists are not the model for how we make America a safer and more inclusive place for black people, and for everyone.”
Asked about Booker’s remarks by reporters, Biden declined to offer an apology and instead demanded one from Booker. The two men later spoke privately.
“Cory shared directly what he said publicly — including helping Vice President Biden understand why the word ‘boy’ is painful to so many,” said Sabrina Singh, a Booker campaign spokeswoman. “Cory believes that Vice President Biden should take responsibility for what he said and apologize to those who were hurt.”
Biden’s campaign would not elaborate on the call, but it is clear the topic could linger over the coming days.
Biden has scheduled a sit-down interview with MSNBC, his campaign has been sending out talking points to surrogates, and some black supporters are eager to hear the former vice president offer a fuller explanation.
“I think he’s got to address it head on and show people what his line of thinking was,” said Antjuan Seawright, a Democratic strategist in South Carolina who is close with Biden’s team. “I don’t think they need to get off course with their strategy. I just think they have to address it as it comes up and move on.”
Other Biden supporters, however, think he’s taking just the right approach and standing by his long-held beliefs.
I encouraged campaign staff that I know to say: ‘Don’t back off on this. This is precisely why you’re the right guy in the right place at the right time.’ And I was glad to see that he didn’t,” said Dave O’Brien, a longtime Biden supporter in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.
“You know that some of the other issues, he’s got to evolve with the times, which he has,” O’Brien added. “But there are points where you need to make a stand, so I was very glad to see him not back off on this issue.”
Democratic presidential candidate, former Vice President Joe Biden, speaks at the Poor People’s Moral Action Congress presidential forum in Washington, Monday, June 17, 2019. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)
Joe Biden refused calls to apologize Wednesday for saying that the Senate “got things done” with “civility” even when the body included segregationists with whom he disagreed.
His rivals for the Democratic presidential nomination, including the two major black candidates in the contest, roundly criticized Biden’s comments. But Biden didn’t back down and was particularly defiant in the face of criticism from New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, who said the former vice president should apologize for his remarks.
Biden countered that it was Booker who should apologize because the senator “should know better” than to question his commitment to civil rights.
“There’s not a racist bone in my body,” Biden said. “I’ve been involved in civil rights my whole career.”
Speaking on CNN, Booker responded: “I was raised to speak truth to power and that I shall never apologize for doing that. And Vice President Biden shouldn’t need this lesson.”
The firestorm is quickly becoming one of the most intense disputes of the Democratic presidential primary, underscoring the hazards for Biden as he tries to turn his decades of Washington experience into an advantage. Instead, he’s infuriating Democrats who say he’s out of step with the diverse party of the 21st century and potentially undermining his argument that he’s the most electable candidate in the race.
The controversy began at a New York fundraiser Tuesday when Biden pointed to long-dead segregationist senators James Eastland of Mississippi and Herman Talmadge of Georgia to argue that Washington functioned more smoothly a generation ago than under today’s “broken” hyperpartisanship.
“We didn’t agree on much of anything,” Biden said of the two men, who were prominent senators when Biden was elected in 1972. Biden described Talmadge as “one of the meanest guys I ever knew” and said Eastland called him “son,” though not “boy,” a reference to the racist way many whites addressed black men at the time.
Yet even in that Senate, Biden said, “At least there was some civility. We got things done.”
A pile on from Biden’s rivals quickly ensued. Booker said he was disappointed by Biden’s remarks.
“I have to tell Vice President Biden, as someone I respect, that he is wrong for using his relationships with Eastland and Talmadge as examples of how to bring our country together,” said Booker, who is African American.
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, a fellow Democratic presidential candidate and a white man who is married to a black woman, tweeted: “It’s 2019 & @JoeBiden is longing for the good old days of ‘civility’ typified by James Eastland. Eastland thought my multiracial family should be illegal.”
California Sen. Kamala Harris, a black presidential candidate, said Biden was “coddling” segregationists in a way that “suggests to me that he doesn’t understand … the dark history of our country” — a characterization Biden’s campaign rejects.
Former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke, another 2020 candidate, said, “For the vice president to somehow say that what we’re seeing in this country today is a function of partisanship or a lack of bipartisanship completely ignores the legacy of slavery and the active suppression of African Americans and communities of color right now.”
The tumult comes at a crucial point in the campaign. Biden is still recovering from controversy he sparked earlier this month when he angered many Democrats by saying he didn’t support federal taxpayer money supporting abortion. He later reversed his position.
He’s among the more than 20 candidates who will descend on South Carolina this weekend to make their case to black voters at a series of Democratic events.
Meanwhile, most Democratic White House hopefuls will again gather in Miami next week for the first presidential debate of the primary season. Biden will almost certainly come under fire there for his comments this week.
He sought to defuse the tension on Wednesday by saying he was trying to argue that leaders sometimes have to work with people they disagree with to achieve goals, such as renewing the Voting Rights Act.
“The point I’m making is you don’t have to agree. You don’t have to like the people in terms of their views,” he said Wednesday. “But you just simply make the case and you beat them without changing the system.”
He has received support from some black leaders. Cedric Richmond, Biden’s campaign co-chairman and former Congressional Black Caucus chairman, said Biden’s opponents deliberately ignored the full context of his argument for a more functional government.
“Maybe there’s a better way to say it, but we have to work with people, and that’s a fact,” Richmond said, noting he dealt recently with President Donald Trump to pass a long-sought criminal justice overhaul. “I question (Trump’s) racial sensitivity, a whole bunch of things about his character … but we worked together.”
Likewise, Richmond said, Biden mentioned Jim Crow-era senators to emphasize the depths of disagreements elected officials sometimes navigate. “If he gets elected president, we don’t have 60 votes in the Senate” to overcome filibusters, Richmond noted. “He could be less genuine and say, ‘We’re just going to do all these things.’ But we already have a president like that. (Biden) knows we have to build consensus.”
Biden also drew a qualified defense from Republican Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, the only black senator from his party. Scott said that Biden “should have used a different group of senators” to make his point but that his remarks “have nothing to do with his position on race” issues. Scott said the reaction reflects an intense environment for Democrats in which the desire to defeat Trump means “anything the front-runner says that is off by a little bit” will be magnified.
This was the week that the battle for the nomination got real.
Part 2– Story 4: President Trump Pushes All The Right Buttons in 2020 Stump Speech in Orlando, Florida –Send Them Home — Lock Them Up — Four More Years — Videos
TRUMP 2020: President Trump Re-Election Campaign Rally – FULL SPEECH
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THE PRESIDENT IS BACK: President Trump Returns From MASSIVE Orlando Rally
The Memo: Can Trump run as an outsider?
BY NIALL STANAGE – 06/20/19 06:00 AM EDT
President Trump is running for reelection as an outsider candidate. But it’s a knotty challenge for someone who holds the world’s most powerful office.
Trump’s speech in Orlando, Fla., on Tuesday, which officially launched his 2020 bid, was rife with rhetoric portraying himself — and by extension his supporters — as victims of nefarious elites.
The president said that he and his allies were besieged by a “permanent political class” and “an unholy alliance of lobbyists and donors and special interests.”
“Our patriotic movement has been under assault from the very first day,” Trump insisted at one point. Moments before, he told the crowd, “the swamp is fighting back so viciously and violently.”
It’s the kind of language that makes Democrats roll their eyes. Trump, they note, is a billionaire property developer, born into wealth, who won the presidency on his first attempt — yet he portrays himself as the tribune of “the forgotten men and women of our country” whom he invoked in his January 2017 inaugural address.
But Trump’s unconventionality might, in itself, help him retain some kind of outsider cachet in a way that is unusual for an incumbent president.
“For any other president, yes, it is a challenge,” said Alex Conant, a Republican strategist who worked for Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) in the 2016 presidential primaries.
“But Trump is unlike any other president. Trump has been at war with the establishment since the moment he set foot in the White House,” he said.
It is certainly true that Trump was viewed with suspicion by the Republican Party from the time he began his presidential run — and that his language and attitudes are viewed with distaste by much of the Beltway political class.
But dislike for Trump’s personal antics is hardly confined to D.C. elites.
A Pew Research Center poll in March showed pluralities of the public believing that he was not “trustworthy,” “even-tempered” or “well-informed.”
For all Trump’s supposed concern with less affluent Americans, 56 percent of the respondents in the Pew poll said they did not believe he cared about “people like me,” whereas just 40 percent said he did care.
The GOP has largely made peace with him, with former rivals including Sens. Lindsey Graham (S.C.) and Rand Paul (Ky.) becoming enthusiastic supporters, congressional dissenters such as former Rep. Mark Sanford(R-S.C.) having been defeated in primaries and Trump now in firm control of the party apparatus.
Skeptics also point to both policies and personnel — from the steep cut in the corporate tax rate in 2017 to the 16-month run of the ethically challenged Scott Pruitt as head of the Environmental Protection Agency — as evidence that the swamp has remained undrained under Trump.
But Trump allies are insistent that the president’s feel for the cultural mores of blue-collar America remains a potent and underrated political weapon.
“He is certainly an outsider to the political establishment. They still don’t get him and he is not coming around to their way of thinking,” said Barry Bennett, who worked as a senior adviser to Trump’s 2016 campaign. “He may live inside the gates but he does not live inside the establishment. … I don’t know anyone who believes he has become some kind of Georgetown socialite.”
Michael Caputo, a longtime Trump friend, insisted, “I have never ever met anyone, any Trump supporter, who believes anything else besides the fact that he’s an outsider.”
There is clearly a political dividend to be gained if Trump can hold onto his outsider image.
In the recent past, voters in presidential elections have often chosen the candidate seen as less steeped in the ways of Washington.
Former President Obama won election twice as a change agent, initially winning the White House as the first black president and then securing a second term over GOP nominee Mitt Romney, the personification of a genteel Republican establishment.
Former President George W. Bush had only a tenuous claim to outsider status, given he was the son of a president — yet his campaign was able to paint then-Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) as a creature of Washington in the 2004 presidential election.
Before that, former President Clinton used his down-home Arkansas image as a weapon against an incumbent president, Bush’s father, George H.W Bush, and then won a second term over another GOP establishment favorite, then-Sen. Bob Dole (Kan.).
Independent observers acknowledge that Trump’s style, divisive though it is, could help him be seen as much more of a disruptor even than these recent predecessors.
“It’s almost impossible for an incumbent to run as an outsider, but Trump has held onto that credential,” said Tobe Berkovitz, a Boston University professor who specializes in political communications. “He is parlaying that into how he sees himself — running against the Democrats, the media, the elites.”
Republicans, meanwhile, argue that Trump’s outsider image could be especially useful if Democrats pick former Vice President Joe Biden as their nominee.
Biden, in their telling, is much easier to brand as a creature of Washington given his decades in the Senate. There will be a different challenge if Democrats instead choose one of Biden’s rivals who is a fresher face on the national political scene, such as Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) or Sen Kamala Harris (D-Calif.); or more radical, such as Sen. Bernie Sanders(I-Vt.).
Trump, billionaire Manhattanite though he may be, has long used the idea that he is sneered at by a snobbish elite to his own advantage.
On Tuesday, he told his supporters that Democrats “want to destroy you.”
It was a stark and visceral remark even by Trump’s standards.
But, after his 2016 victory, even his critics can’t be so sure it won’t work.
Trump can’t win by relitigating 2016 and playing only to his base.
By The Editorial Board June 19, 2019 7:18 pm ET
President Donald Trump looks on during a rally at the Amway Center in Orlando, Florida to officially launch his 2020 campaign on June 18.PHOTO: MANDEL NGAN/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES
President Trump announced his campaign for a second term at a rally in Orlando on Tuesday evening that recounted his first-term record and 2016 victory before thousands of rapturous supporters. The only thing missing was an agenda for 2020.
The most striking fact of his speech was how backward looking it was. Every incumbent needs to remind voters of his record, Mr. Trump more than most because the media are so hostile.
Donald Trump Launches Campaign
The President is also right that his opponents have refused to recognize the legitimacy of his election. House Democrats may still try to impeach him for not obstructing an investigation into what wasn’t a conspiracy with Russia. His sense of “grievance,” to quote the media meme about his speech, on that point is entirely justified.
Yet Mr. Trump is asking for four more years, and his preoccupation with vindicating 2016 won’t resonate much beyond his core supporters. Most voters have moved on from 2016, which is why a majority opposes impeachment in every poll. They don’t much care about Mr. Trump’s greatest hits about Hillary Clinton, who alas for the President will not be on the ballot in 2020. They want to know why they should take a risk on Mr. Trump and his volatile character for another term.
This is all the more important given the way his first term has evolved on policy. One paradox is that his main policy successes have come from pursuing a conventional conservative agenda. The failures have been on the issues like trade and immigration that are the most identified with Trumpian disruption.
The economy’s renewed growth spurt came from tax reform, deregulation, liberating energy production and ending the anti-business harassment of the Obama years. His remaking of the judiciary and rebuilding of the military unite Republicans of all stripes. Criminal justice reform was the result of years of spade work on the right and left.
Mr. Trump deserves credit for pursuing all of this despite often ferocious opposition that might have intimidated a different GOP President. That’s true in particular of his withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal and the Paris climate accord, where U.S. Democratic and media opinion is aligned with Europe’s elites.
On immigration, however, the President missed a chance to strike a deal trading more border security (including his wall) for legalizing Dreamers. He must now confront the asylum crisis at the border with no help from Democrats. On trade, Mr. Trump has disrupted global rules but has put nothing new and stable in their place. Asking voters to believe he’ll do better on these issues in a second term isn’t likely to turn many swing voters his way.
The other paradox of the Trump Presidency is his low approval rating despite a stronger economy. The polls show his approval rating on the economy is above 50% but his overall approval is 44.3% in the Real Clear Politics average. The difference is best explained by Mr. Trump’s polarizing behavior, which has alienated in particular college-educated voters and Republican women. In the latest Wall Street Journal-NBC poll, Mr. Trump is underwater with white college-educated women by a remarkable 20 percentage points.
Mr. Trump may figure he can persuade some of those skeptics by making the Democratic nominee even more unpopular than he is. If the Democrats oblige by nominating Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren, that might be possible. But that is making a bet on the other party’s mistake, and a re-election campaign is typically a referendum on the incumbent.
Which is all the more reason to offer voters something more for a second term. He could put Democrats on the spot for high housing prices and homelessness by talking about restrictive zoning for elites and high property taxes. He could offer to reform higher education by making schools responsible for some of the debt of students who can’t repay loans, or invigorate vocational education to help young people who can’t go to college.
He could package health-care proposals to expand choice, reduce prices and make insurance portable; his administration has already proposed some of them. He could advance his theme of “draining the swamp” by offering ideas to reform the civil service. We’d include entitlement reform, but then Mr. Trump has shown no interest and we don’t believe in political miracles.
This is far from an exhaustive list, and Mr. Trump won’t win as a policy wonk in any case. But Mr. Trump also won’t win by relitigating the 2016 election or playing only to his political base. He needs more than he offered voters on Tuesday night.
Opinion: Countering Trump With Reliability, Not Bold Agenda
A Fox News poll has found that Democrats prefer a “steady” candidate to a “big agenda” candidate. But going up against the scale of Donald Trump will be tough, so how do frontrunners Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren compare? Image: Getty
‘This election is about you. Your family, your future & the fate of YOUR country’: Trump lays it on the line at 20,000-strong Orlando rally as he kicks off 2020 re-election campaign with his entire family and obligatory digs at ‘Crooked Hillary’
The president spent the first half-hour of a Tuesday night rally hammering his old foe Hillary Clinton
Trump said his team wondered if it should hold the rally in a venue which can hold 20,000 people
‘Not only did we fill it up, but we had 120,000 requests… Congratulations!’ the president said to cheers
The president’s daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, invited the criticism when she wound up an arena of supporters
Husband Eric, who spoke after her, had a crowd of more than 20,000 screaming, ‘CNN Sucks!’
‘He loves this country and we, as a family, love this country. We’re going to fight like hell,’ Eric said
Donald Trump Jr. mocked Joe Biden before the rowdy crowd that waited in the heat and rain for hours
‘He gets up on the stump. It’s so stupid,’ he said, claiming the ex-VP has four-person crowds
PUBLISHED: 18:49 EDT, 18 June 2019 | UPDATED: 11:47 EDT, 19 June 2019
President Trump spent a Tuesday night rally he’d advertised as a 2020 kickoff hammering his old foe Hillary Clinton for acid washing her emails and failing to deliver on her pledge to beat him, while Democrats vying for the party’s nomination now escaped his wrath.
Noting that he’s under constant media scrutiny, Trump said that he’d be sent to the slammer if he ordered aides to destroy potential evidence.
‘But, can you imagine if I got a subpoena, think of this, if I got a subpoena for emails, if I deleted one email like a love note to Melania, it’s the electric chair for Trump,’ he claimed in a campaign speech in Orlando.
Trump said subpoenas he’s receiving are not about Democratic claims that his campaign may have colluded with Russia.
‘The Democrats don’t care about Russia, they only care about their own political power. They went after my family, my business, my finances, my employees, almost everyone that I’ve ever known or worked with,’ he argued. ‘But they are really going after you. That’s what it’s all about. It’s not about us, it’s about you. They tried to erase your vote, erase your legacy of the greatest campaign and the greatest election probably in the history of our country.’
U.S. President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump arrive on stage to formally kick off his re-election bid with a campaign rally in Orlando. He kicked off first official 2020 rally by claiming 120,000 people submitted requests to attend
First lady Melania Trump speaks as Trump looks on. Trump’s first official campaign rally of 2020 opened much the way his 2016 candidacy ended – with his audience chanting ‘Lock her Up!’ in a slam on former Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton
Trump’s campaign turned the area outside the arena that can seat 20,000 people into a festival-like atmosphere with music and food trucks to help supporters pass the time
Michael Boulos, Tiffany Trump, Lara Trump, Eric Trump, Jared Kushner, Ivanka Trump, Kimberly Guilfoyle, and Donald Trump Jr. arrive at a rally for US President Donald Trump
FLOTUS Melania introduces her husband at Trump 2020 rally
The president said, ‘They wanted to deny you the future you demanded and the future that America deserved and that now America is getting. Our radical Democrat opponents are driven by hatred, prejudice and rage. They want to destroy you, and they want to destroy our country as we know it. Not acceptable, it’s not going to happen. Not gonna happen.’
Trump claimed that Democrats as a party would use the ‘power of the law to punish their opponents’ if they’re handed the reigns to the country.
‘Imagine if we had a Democrat president and a Democrat Congress in 2020. They would shut down your free speech, use the power of the law to punish their opponents – which they’re trying to do now anyway – they’ll always be trying to shield themselves,’ he claimed. ‘They will strip Americans of their Constitutional rights while flooding the country with illegal immigrants in the hopes it will expand their political base and they’ll get votes someplace down the future. That’s what it’s about.’
Broad attacks on the Democratic Party and ‘radical socialism’ were the most stringent assaults that Trump would levy all night.
He said, ‘More than 120 Democrats in Congress have also signed up to support “Crazy Bernie Sanders” socialist government takeover of health care.
‘He seems not to be doing too well lately,’ the president said as an aside. ‘They want to end Medicare as we know it and terminate the private health insurance of 180 million Americans who love their health insurance. America will never be a socialist country.’
It was his only mention at the rally of one of his most formidable opponents. Former Democratic President Joe Biden was also a footnote in the speech, earning two mentions, as a part of the ‘Obama-Biden’ duo that Trump said ruined American foreign policy and drove down the nation’s economy.
‘Remember the statement from the previous administration? Would need a magic wand to bring back manufacturing? Well, tell “Sleepy Joe” that we found the magic wand. That’s a sleepy guy,’ the president added.
Trump outlined his vision tweeting: ‘Don’t ever forget – this election is about YOU. It is about YOUR family, YOUR future, & the fate of YOUR COUNTRY. We begin our campaign with the best record, the best results, the best agenda, & the only positive VISION for our Country’s future! #Trump2020’
The Trumps said their family has been under attack since the family patriarch declared his candidacy for president in 2015. Jared Kushner, left, Ivanka Trump arrive for the official launch of the Trump 2020 campaign
Donald Trump Jr. channeled his attacks to his father’s current opponents, mocking leading Democratic candidate Joe Biden before the rowdy crowd that waited in the heat and rain for hours, and days in some cases, to see the sitting president. Kimberly Guilfoyle, left, and Donald Trump Jr. pictured
Senior adviser Jared Kushner, Ivanka Trump and Kimberly Guilfoyle, watch as President Donald Trump speaks at his re-election kickoff rally at the Amway Center
Trump rails against Democrats, Mueller and ‘fake news’ at 2020 rally
Trump’s first official campaign rally of 2020 opened much the way his 2016 candidacy ended – with his audience chanting ‘Lock her Up!’ in a slam on former Democratic opponent Clinton.
The president’s daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, invited the criticism first. She wound up an arena of supporters with a claim that the media was saying Clinton was going to be the 45th President of the United States days before the election. ‘They have always been wrong,’ she declared.
Attacks on the media as ‘fake news’ and ‘dishonest’ from Lara and her husband Eric, who spoke after her, had a crowd of more than 20,000 screaming ‘CNN Sucks!’ minutes later.
The Trumps said their family has been under attack from one group or another since the family patriarch declared his candidacy for president in 2015.
‘He loves this country and we, as a family, love this country. And guys we are going to fight like hell – our family is going to fight like hell for this country. We will never ever stop fighting, and we will never ever, ever stop winning,’ the president’s son said. ‘And guys, we love you very much. We’re all going to be spending a lot of time in Florida. We’re going to be spending a lot of time in Florida. So we’re going to see you.’
Donald Trump Jr. channeled his attacks to his father’s current opponents, mocking Biden before the rowdy crowd that waited in the heat and rain for hours, and days in some cases, to see the sitting president.
‘I don’t know about you, but I look around this room and when Joe Biden’s putting about seven people in an audience, I’m saying, “I think they may be a little wrong with the polling.” But what they hell do I know?’ he said.
National polls show Biden beating Trump in a general election. A Quinnipiac University survey that came out Tuesday found that the former vice president would beat Trump by nine points, 50 – 41, the newly-released poll showed.
Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders would win by a similar margin, 48 – 42, while other top Democrats would perform in the poll’s margin of error.
Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale told DailyMail.com inside the rally that Quinnipiac is ‘c**p’ in response to the latest poll showing bad news in a critical swing state for the controversial president.
Trump had already warned the public that this official launch of 2020 campaign would be ‘wild,’ after supporters camped out in tents for more than 30 hours to save their places at the front of a massive line that would ensure them floor seats
US First Lady Melania Trump greets US Vice President Mike Pence. Trump set the tone for the monster rally in a morning tweet that bashed the media and compared the scene outside the Amway Center to a rock tour
Lara Trump takes to the stage before her father-in-law United States President Donald Trump arrives on stage to announce his candidacy for a second presidential term at the Amway Center
Donald Trump Jr. throws hats to supporters at the rally. He mocked Joe Biden before the rowdy crowd that waited for hours
Trump attacks Democrats at his Orlando rally
Don Jr. brushed off the threat from Biden, 76, as he campaigned for his father, 73, on Tuesday in Orlando. He called Biden and his competitors a ‘clown show’ and gave the Democrat a new nickname. ‘Sloppy Joe,’ he called him, as he hit Biden for flip-flopping.
‘He gets up on the stump. It’s so stupid,’ he said. ‘To his group of about four people in the audience, “Government has failed you.” Usually, as he’s groping someone. It ain’t pretty, but there’s something off with that guy.’
The president’s son said he agrees that government is broken and it’s a problem. ‘The problem is Joe, you’ve been in government for almost 50 years. If government failed you, maybe you’re the problem Joe Biden,’ he said. ‘It’s not rocket science.’
Trump warned the public that the campaign rally would be ‘wild,’ and Don Jr. helped him deliver on the pledge.
He mocked Biden’s pledge to cure cancer, asking, ‘Why the hell didn’t you do that over the last 50 years, Joe?’
Don Jr. blamed the media for giving Biden a pass. ‘Why did not one of them say, “Well, Joe, how exactly are you going to do that?” And why didn’t you do that in the last eight years as vice president and the prior 40 years in government and the Senate?’
His father later claimed that he’d cure cancer in remarks that followed. ‘We will push onward with new medical frontiers. We will come up with the cures to many, many problems, to many, many diseases, including cancer and others and we’re getting closer all the time,’ he said.
Attacks on Clinton and media were a common theme throughout the night, with Trump pausing and waiting for his supporters to cheer, ‘CNN SUCKS!’ and ‘Lock her Up!’ as he talked about the former secretary of state’s acid-washed emails and her loss to him in the last election.
‘It was all an illegal attempt to overturn the results of our election, spy on our campaign, which is what they did,’ he complained.
Trump meets fans after stepping off Air Force One upon arrival at Miami International Airport in Miami
Vice President Mike Pence, escorted in by Karen Pence, speaks before Trump takes the stage on Tuesday evening
A man holds up a sign as the crowd waits for US President Donald Trump to arrive at a rally at the Amway Center in Orlando, Florida to officially launch his 2020 campaign
Melania’s spokesperson Stephanie Grisham speaks with White House senior advisor Kellyanne Conway at the campaign rally
President Trump said as he opened the event that he could feel the ‘magic’ in Orlando – a play on the name of the city’s professional basketball team.
He spoke to supporters in the same arena that the team plays in, which is a venue that can hold roughly 20,000 people.
‘You know, I said, “This is a very big arena for a Tuesday night.” I said, “You know, if we have about three or four empty seats, the fake news will say – headlines: he didn’t fill up the arena.” So I said maybe we shouldn’t take the chance, maybe we shouldn’t go to Orlando, maybe we should go someplace else,’ Trump said in his opening remarks. ‘I said, “No, I think we’ll go to Orlando.” And, not only did we fill it up, but we had 120,000 requests. That means you folks have come out very, very good.’
Supporters camped out in tents for more than 30 hours to save their places at the front of a massive line that would ensure them floor seats at Tuesday evening’s show.
Saundra Kiczenski, a Michigan native who works in retail, waited from 7am on Monday. She said she’d been to rallies in support of the president in 15 states. She spent Monday night on the pavement in a sleeping bag.
‘I took the hotel pillow and slept on the ground,’ she told DailyMail.com on Tuesday afternoon as she waited to get in.
The Republican incumbent set the tone for the monster rally in Florida he’d be appearing at in the evening in a morning tweet that bashed the media and compared the scene outside the Amway Center to a rock tour.
‘The Fake News doesn’t report it, but Republican enthusiasm is at an all time high. Look what is going on in Orlando, Florida, right now! People have never seen anything like it (unless you play a guitar). Going to be wild – See you later!’ he tweeted on Tuesday morning.
A cover band with aging rockers who call themselves ‘The Guzzlers’ revved up the crowd under a beating sun at a ‘festival’ the campaign held in an outdoor parking lot, where vendors sold a captive and cramped group sodas, snow cones and Trump umbrellas.
Sweltering heat that topped 87 degrees soon turned to pouring rain, giving the umbrellas a dual purpose for supporters like Richard Snowden who chose to remain.
A resident of Las Vegas, Nevada, Snowden said he’d be ‘remiss’ to have skipped the kickoff. He told DailyMail.com from the comfort of a party-style tent his group had pitched that he’d attended 54 rallies since Trump announced his candidacy for office in 2015.
But even Snowden called himself a pragmatist and said of the president’s reelection odds, ‘I don’t think it’s going to be a cakewalk.’
‘The incumbency will help. He won’t catch them flat-footed this time,’ he observed, as he waited for the rally to begin. ‘And he won’t have the dislike of Hillary working in his favor,’ he said in remarks that proved to prescient.
The US President and First Lady Melania Trump are pictured stepping off Air Force One upon arrival at Orlando International Airport in Orlando, Florida Tuesday
Special advisor to the US president Jared Kushner and White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, left, and Michael Boulos and Tiffany Trump, right, wait for the arrival of US President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump at Orlando International Airport on Tuesday
Donald Trump is putting an advisory on his Orlando rally, saying the official launch of 2020 campaign will be ‘wild,’ after supporters camped out in tents to save their places in line like they were waiting in line for a free concert with Rihanna
Supporters of President Donald Trump wait in line hours before the arena doors open for a campaign rally Tuesday
Patriotic colors: Trump supporters came in red white and blue for the campaign kick-off
Determined: The early start was an attempt by the fanatical Trump backers to be at the front of the crowd for the campaign kick-off
Trump, in 2020 campaign mode, calls Democrats ‘radical’
By JILL COLVIN, JONATHAN LEMIRE and MICHAEL SCHNEIDERtoday
President Donald Trump jabbed at the press and poked the political establishment he ran against in 2016 as he kicked off his reelection campaign with a grievance-filled rally focused more on settling scores than laying out his agenda for a possible second term.
Addressing a crowd of thousands at Orlando’s Amway Center on Tuesday night, Trump complained he was “under assault from the very first day” of his presidency by a “fake news media” and an “illegal witch hunt” that had tried to keep him and his supporters down.
He painted a disturbing picture of what life would look like if he loses in 2020, accusing his critics of “un-American conduct” and saying Democrats “want to destroy you and they want to destroy our country as we know it.”
“A vote for any Democrat in 2020 is a vote for the rise of radical socialism and the destruction of the American dream,” he said. Trump made only passing mention of any of the Democrats running to replace him even as he tossed out “radical” and “unhinged” to describe the rival party.
Trump has long railed against the special counsel’s investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election and the ongoing probes by House Democrats in the aftermath of Robert Mueller’s report .
The apocalyptic language and finger-pointing made clear that Trump’s 2020 campaign will probably look a whole lot like his run three years ago. Even after two-and-a-half years in the Oval Office, Trump remains focused on energizing his base and offering himself as a political outsider running against Washington.
Republican Party Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel tweeted Wednesday morning that Trump had raised $24.8 million in less than 24 hours for his reelection.
In his speech, Trump spent considerably more time focused on former Democratic rival Hillary Clinton than on his current 2020 challengers, even though she is not on the ballot.
Thousands of Trump supporters began gathering outside the arena on Monday.
“Trump has been the best president we’ve ever had,” said Ron Freitas, a retired Merchant Marine and registered Democrat from Orlando.
Hundreds of anti-Trump protesters clapped and took photos when a 20-foot (6-meter) blimp of a snarling Trump baby in a diaper was inflated. Some members of the far-right hate group Proud Boys were also spotted marching outside the rally.
Trump aides scheduled the kickoff near the four-year anniversary of the day when the former reality television star and New York tabloid fixture launched his longshot campaign for president with a famous escalator ride in front of a crowd that included paid actors.
Trump spoke fondly of his 2016 race, calling it “a defining moment in American history.” He said that in the years since, he had upended Washington, staring down “a corrupt and broken political establishment” and restoring a government “of, for and by the people.”
He never has really stopped running. He filed for reelection on Jan. 20, 2017, the day of his inauguration, and held his first 2020 rally in February, 2017, in nearby Melbourne. He has continued holding his signature “Make America Great Again” rallies in the months since.
Trump asked the crowd whether he should stick with “Make America Great Again” or upgrade his slogan. His new one — “Keep America Great” — was greeted with boisterous cheers.
Trump is hoping to replicate the dynamics that allowed him to take charge of the Republican Party and then the presidency as an insurgent intent on disrupting the status quo. In 2016, he successfully appealed to disaffected voters who felt left behind by economic dislocation and demographic shifts. He has no intention of abandoning that mantle, even if he is the face of the institutions he looks to disrupt.
That promise, which came with no details and sparked Democratic condemnation, seemed to offer a peek into a campaign that will largely be fought along the same lines as his first bid, with very few new policy proposals for a second term.
Early Democratic front-runner Joe Biden said Trump’s politics are “all about dividing us” in ways that are “dangerous — truly, truly dangerous.”
Another leading Democratic contender, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, said Trump had delivered “an hour-and-a-half speech of lies, distortions and total, absolute nonsense.”
But those involved in the president’s reelection effort believe his version of populism, combined with his mantra to “Drain the Swamp,” still resonates, despite his administration’s ties with lobbyists and corporations and the Trump family’s apparent efforts to profit off the presidency.Critics have pointed out his constant promotion for his golf courses, both at home and abroad, and note that this daughter, White House senior aide Ivanka Trump, made $4 million last year from her stake in the president’s Washington hotel, which has become a favored destination for foreign nationals looking to curry favor with the administration.
Advisers believe that, in an age of extreme polarization, many Trump backers view their support for the president as part of their identity, one not easily shaken. They point to his seemingly unmovable support with his base supporters as evidence that he is still viewed the same way he was as a candidate: a political rebel.
Trump tried to make the case that he had made good on his 2016 promises, including cracking down on illegal immigration and boosting jobs.
Near the rally’s end, Trump ran through a list of promises for a second term, pledging a new immigration system, new trade deals, a health care overhaul and a cure for cancer and “many diseases,” including eradicating AIDS in America.
President Trump spent a Tuesday night rally he’d advertised as a 2020 kickoff hammering his old foe Hillary Clinton for acid washing her emails and failing to deliver on her pledge to beat him, while Democrats vying for the party’s nomination now escaped his wrath.
Noting that he’s under constant media scrutiny, Trump said that he’d be sent to the slammer if he ordered aides to destroy potential evidence.
‘But, can you imagine if I got a subpoena, think of this, if I got a subpoena for emails, if I deleted one email like a love note to Melania, it’s the electric chair for Trump,’ he claimed in a campaign speech in Orlando.
Trump said subpoenas he’s receiving are not about Democratic claims that his campaign may have colluded with Russia.
A sunshine state of mind! Melania and Donald Trump gaze lovingly at one another as they leave the White House hand-in-hand and head to Florida for the president’s 2020 rally
Trump, 73, and Melania, 49, departed the White House together on Tuesday to fly to Florida
The President will be officially launching his 2020 campaign with a rally at the Amway Center
The first lady wore a summery $2,290 white eyelet Andrew Gin dress with a pair of red and white polka-dot heels
She grinned at her husband as they walked hand-in-hand to Marine One
Melania is not expected to speak at the event, which will include an estimated 20,000 people
PUBLISHED: 18:06 EDT, 18 June 2019 | UPDATED: 20:48 EDT, 18 June 2019
Donald and Melania Trump had a rare romantic public moment on Tuesday as the two left the White House for Orlando, Florida.
The President and first lady walked hand-in-hand across the South Lawn of the White House before boarding Marine One on their way to Trump’s 2020 campaign kickoff rally.
Cameras caught the couple sharing a warm smile as they held onto each other, Trump, 73, dressed in a navy suit and red tie and his 49-year-old wife took advantage of the June heat in a $2,290 summery white eyelet dress from Andrew Gin, and red polka-dot heels.
All smiles: Donald and Melania Trump held hands and beamed at one another as they walked across the White House lawn to begin their trip to Orlando, Florida, on Tuesday
Ready to get away! The 49-year-old first lady couldn’t wipe the smile off her face as she and the president strolled across the South Lawn
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On their way: They appeared to be in good spirits as they set out for Orlando, Florida
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Hands on: At one point, Trump clasped one of Melania’s hands in both of his own
The couple isn’t typically much for PDA but shared an intimate smile as they walked passed photographers.
They held each other’s hands, with Trump stopping at one point in order to clasp Melania’s left hand in both of his own.
Melania beat the heat, which is hovering in the mid-to-high 80s in Washington, D.C. today, in a breezy but figure-flaunting white sleeveless dress, which featured a seasonally appropriate eyelet patter with floral cutouts on the top.
She accessorized with a pair of dark sunglasses and red and white pointy-toe pumps. while wearing her brown hair blown out around her shoulders.
The couple, who married in 2005, celebrated their 14th wedding anniversary in January, just one year less than he was married to his first wife Ivana.
The couple grinned as they boarded Marine One and then switched planes for Air Force One at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland.
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Hot out here: Melania wore a summery white eyelet dress for the occasion, as temperatures soared into the high 80s
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Protection: She shielded her eyes behind a pair of sunglasses
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High heels: On her feet were a pair of red polka dot pointy-toe pumps
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Ready to go: The well-coiffed first lady had her hair and nails done
They’re flying down not to Mar-a-Lago but Orlando, where Trump is kicking off his 2020 presidential campaign at the Amway Center in front of an estimated 20,000 people.
Trump’s campaign is transforming the area outside the arena to have a festival-like atmosphere, with music and food trucks to help supporters pass the time.
The most coveted positions are not seats at all, but standing positions near the front of the stage. Backers of the president in that area are likely to get a handshake, a selfie or Trump’s autograph at the event that formally marks the beginning of his campaign for a second term.
All of Trump’s children and his wife Melania will be with him at the event, sources told DailyMail.com, as will the Mike Pence, the president’s running mate and the nation’s vice president.
The first lady does not plan to make formal remarks on Tuesday night, her office said, but given the president’s tendency to call on people to speak, she could end up addressing the crowd.
Donald Trump, Jr., on the other hand is expected to give remarks before the rally.
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Beat the heat: Melania kept breezy in the lightweight dress, which will likely also serve her well in the Florida heat
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Staying behind: The first lady does not plan to make formal remarks on Tuesday night, her office said
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Change of plan? The couple’s 13-year-old son Barron is also expected to be at the rally, but was not seen traveling with them
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Family affair: Trump’s adult children — Ivanka, Don Jr., Eric, and Tiffany — are also expected to be there
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Melania continued to smile at her husband as they switched planes at Joint Base Andrews
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See ya! Trump waved goodbye as they boarded the plane together
The president’s eldest son is a frequent presence at campaign events — with and without his father — and often serves as a warm-up act for the president’s supporters. He’s also campaigned and raised money for other Republican candidates since his father entered politics.
His girlfriend Kimberly Guilfoyle, a former Fox News personality, is also scheduled to be at the rally. She serves as a senior adviser to the president’s reelection campaign.
Senior advisers and family members to the president Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump are also expected to be at the rally.
It’s unclear if Lara Trump, wife of Eric Trump, will be in Orlando. She serves as a senior adviser to the president’s campaign, but is also pregnant with the couple’s second child. She made a state trip to the UK in early June.
It will be 13-year-old Barron Trump’s first appearance at a campaign rally since his father took office.
Trump’s youngest daughter Tiffany, who has been less involved than her older siblings in her father’s campaigns and administration, will also be there.
Orlando Trump supporters stakeout spots ahead of rally
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Waiting for him: The rally will mark the official launch of 2020 campaign
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Patience: Supporters waited in line hours before the arena doors opened on Tuesday
Hot elections: Temperatures soared as Trump supporters waited to be in the front lines for his rally
Wild: The Republican incumbent set the tone in a morning tweet that bashed the media and compared the scene outside the Amway Center to a rock tour
President Trump release his 2020 campaign ad for re-election
The Republican incumbent set the tone for the monster rally in Florida he’d be appearing at this evening in a morning tweet that bashed the media and compared the scene outside the Amway Center to a rock tour.
‘The Fake News doesn’t report it, but Republican enthusiasm is at an all time high. Look what is going on in Orlando, Florida, right now! People have never seen anything like it (unless you play a guitar). Going to be wild – See you later!’ he said.
Trump had apparently dropped a claim that ‘thousands’ turned up on Monday, with about 250 people camping overnight. But the numbers grew steadily as temperatures soared in Orlando Tuesday, reaching 87 degrees before an hour-long downpour that soaked a waiting crowd.
A new Quinnipiac poll showed Trump losing Florida to Democratic nemesis Joe Biden. The former vice president would beat Trump by nine points, 50 – 41 per cent, the newly-released survey showed.
Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders would win by a similar margin, 48 – 42, while other top Democrats would perform in the poll’s margin of error
43% of Americans say socialism would be a good thing for the country
51% believe socialism would be a bad thing for the country
Americans split on viewing economy as free market or government controlled
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Americans today are more closely divided than they were earlier in the last century when asked whether some form of socialism would be a good or bad thing for the country. While 51% of U.S. adults say socialism would be a bad thing for the country, 43% believe it would be a good thing. Those results contrast with a 1942 Roper/Fortune survey that found 40% describing socialism as a bad thing, 25% a good thing and 34% not having an opinion.
More Americans Now See Socialism as a Good Thing for the Country
Would some form of socialism be a good thing or a bad thing for the country as a whole?
1942
2019
Change
%
%
pct. pts.
Good thing
25
43
+18
Bad thing
40
51
+11
No opinion
34
6
-28
Net “good thing”
-15
-8
+7
Note: 1942 data gathered by Roper Center for Public Opinion Research
GALLUP
The Roper/Fortune survey is one of the oldest trend questions measuring attitudes on socialism in the U.S. Gallup’s update of the question in an April 17-30 survey finds Americans more likely to have an opinion on the matter now, as well as a smaller gap in the percentage calling socialism a bad thing vs. a good thing.
Previous Gallup research shows that Americans’ definition of socialism has changed over the years, with nearly one in four now associating the concept with social equality and 17% associating it with the more classical definition of having some degree of government control over the means of production. A majority of Democrats have said they view socialism positively in Gallup polling since 2010, including 57% in the most recent measure in 2018.
Outlook on Socialism Around the World
The April 17-30 survey also updates another historical question on socialism. Gallup first asked Americans in 1949 about their outlook on the spread of democracy over the next 50 years. At that time, seven in 10 Americans (72%) predicted that most countries in the world would have a democratic government. It’s important to note that in much of the political rhetoric of the time, the terms democracy and capitalism were more intimately intertwined than they are today, perhaps synonymous to many.
Americans’ Views on Future of Democracy and Socialism Globally
During the next 50 years, do you think most of the nations of the world will have a democratic government, a communist government or a socialist government?
1949
2019
Change
%
%
pct. pts.
Democratic
72
57
-15
Socialist
14
29
+15
Communist
9
6
-3
No opinion
5
8
+3
GALLUP
The current update on this question finds a marked increase in the percentage saying that most countries during the next 50 years will have a socialist government (29%). It is unclear whether this is due to the flourishing of democracies — particularly in Europe and Latin America — led by what are often described as social democrats, or whether a fundamental shift is taking place among some Americans in their views of socialism.
Government vs. Free Market
In the same April survey, Gallup asked Americans whether they would prefer mostly free market or government control over several economic and societal activities. Americans are most likely to prefer free market control in the areas of technological innovation and the distribution of wealth. Majorities also want the free market to drive the economy overall, wages, higher education and healthcare.
Preference for the government to serve as the primarily responsible actor only garners majority support for protecting online consumer privacy and the environment.
Majority Want Free Market to Lead on Many Fronts
Would you prefer to have the free market or the government be primarily responsible for what happens in each of the following areas?
Free market
Government
Net “free market”
%
%
pct. pts.
Technological innovation
75
19
+56
The distribution of wealth
68
28
+40
The economy overall
62
33
+29
Wages
62
35
+27
Higher education
56
41
+15
Healthcare
53
44
+9
Protecting consumers’ privacy online
40
57
-17
Environmental protection
30
66
-36
GALLUP, APRIL 17-30, 2019
Notably, more Americans favor free market than government control over healthcare and higher education, two areas in which Democratic politicians have made proposals to greatly expand government involvement. But at least four in 10 Americans appear sympathetic to policies that would increase the government’s role in those areas.
While there is ample support for a market-driven approach to many of the issues cited above, Americans are divided on how they describe the current state of the U.S. economy. When asked whether they think the U.S. economy leans more toward free market control or toward government control, 40% say it leans more toward government control while fewer say it leans toward free market control (34%). One in four describe it as an equal mix.
Bottom Line
Americans’ views on socialism are complex. While some recent data can easily lend to overstated conclusions, there are marked changes in Americans’ views of socialism when taking a longer, more historical look at the data. However, exactly what Americans mean by the term is nuanced and multifaceted. While half of Americans consider socialism as bad for the country, nearly two-thirds say that the U.S. economy is more influenced by the government than the free market, or that it reflects an equal mix of the two.
Additionally, while a majority of Democrats view socialism positively, that is not a major change in the eight years Gallup has tracked this metric. The major shift over this time has been the reduced rate of Democrats who now view capitalism positively (47%).
These data alone make it hard to generalize a simplistic conclusion about Americans’ opinions of, and willingness to entertain, socialism. But there are a few clear takeaways. About four in 10 Americans are accepting of some form of socialism or socialist policies, and Democrats currently have a more positive view of socialism than capitalism. In addition, the April survey found that 47% of Americans say they would vote for a socialist candidate for president. While that figure represents nearly half of the U.S. adult population, even higher percentages say they would vote for an atheist (58%) or Muslim (60%) presidential candidate.
However, when they are asked what role they would like to see the government play in certain areas of society, Americans continue to endorse the free market.
Shifting attitudes about socialism, capitalism, and the current economic and political systems in America — as well as what alternatives many see as solutions for current shortcomings — will continue to be a major focus for Gallup.
Economists, political economists, sociologists and historians have adopted different perspectives in their analyses of capitalism and have recognized various forms of it in practice. These include laissez-faire or free market capitalism, welfare capitalism and state capitalism. Different forms of capitalism feature varying degrees of free markets, public ownership,[9] obstacles to free competition and state-sanctioned social policies. The degree of competition in markets, the role of intervention and regulation, and the scope of state ownership vary across different models of capitalism.[10][11] The extent to which different markets are free as well as the rules defining private property are matters of politics and policy. Most existing capitalist economies are mixed economies, which combine elements of free markets with state intervention and in some cases economic planning.[12]
Critics of capitalism argue that it establishes power in the hands of a minority capitalist class that exists through the exploitation of the majority working class and their labor; prioritizes profit over social good, natural resources and the environment; and is an engine of inequality, corruption and economic instabilities. Supporters argue that it provides better products and innovation through competition, disperses wealth to all productive people, promotes pluralism and decentralization of power, creates strong economic growth, and yields productivity and prosperity that greatly benefit society.
The term “capitalist”, meaning an owner of capital, appears earlier than the term “capitalism” and it dates back to the mid-17th century. “Capitalism” is derived from capital, which evolved from capitale, a late Latin word based on caput, meaning “head”—also the origin of “chattel” and “cattle” in the sense of movable property (only much later to refer only to livestock). Capitale emerged in the 12th to 13th centuries in the sense of referring to funds, stock of merchandise, sum of money or money carrying interest.[24]:232[25][26] By 1283, it was used in the sense of the capital assets of a trading firm and it was frequently interchanged with a number of other words—wealth, money, funds, goods, assets, property and so on.[24]:233
The initial usage of the term “capitalism” in its modern sense has been attributed to Louis Blanc in 1850 (“What I call ‘capitalism’ that is to say the appropriation of capital by some to the exclusion of others”) and Pierre-Joseph Proudhon in 1861 (“Economic and social regime in which capital, the source of income, does not generally belong to those who make it work through their labour”).[24]:237Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels referred to the “capitalistic system”[31][32] and to the “capitalist mode of production” in Capital (1867).[33] The use of the word “capitalism” in reference to an economic system appears twice in Volume I of Capital, p. 124 (German edition) and in Theories of Surplus Value, tome II, p. 493 (German edition). Marx did not extensively use the form capitalism, but instead those of capitalist and capitalist mode of production, which appear more than 2,600 times in the trilogy The Capital. According to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the term “capitalism” first appeared in English in 1854 in the novel The Newcomes by novelist William Makepeace Thackeray, where he meant “having ownership of capital”.[34] Also according to the OED, Carl Adolph Douai, a German Americansocialist and abolitionist, used the phrase “private capitalism” in 1863.
Capitalism in its modern form can be traced to the emergence of agrarian capitalism and mercantilism in the early Renaissance, in city states like Florence.[35]Capital has existed incipiently on a small scale for centuries[36] in the form of merchant, renting and lending activities and occasionally as small-scale industry with some wage labour. Simple commodity exchange and consequently simple commodity production, which are the initial basis for the growth of capital from trade, have a very long history. Classical Islam promulgated capitalist economic policies such as free trade and banking. Their use of Indo-Arabic numerals facilitated bookkeeping. These innovations migrated to Europe through trade partners in cities such as Venice and Pisa. The Italian mathematician Fibonacci traveled the Mediterranean talking to Arab traders, and returned to popularize the use of Indo-Arabic numerals in Europe.[37]
Capital and commercial trade thus existed for much of history, but it did not lead to industrialisation or dominate the production process of society. That required a set of conditions, including specific technologies of mass production, the ability to independently and privately own and trade in means of production, a class of workers willing to sell their labour power for a living, a legal framework promoting commerce, a physical infrastructure allowing the circulation of goods on a large scale and security for private accumulation. Many of these conditions do not currently exist in many Third World countries, although there is plenty of capital and labour. The obstacles for the development of capitalist markets are therefore less technical and more social, cultural and political.
Agrarian capitalism
The economic foundations of the feudal agricultural system began to shift substantially in 16th-century England as the manorial system had broken down and land began to become concentrated in the hands of fewer landlords with increasingly large estates. Instead of a serf-based system of labor, workers were increasingly employed as part of a broader and expanding money-based economy. The system put pressure on both landlords and tenants to increase the productivity of agriculture to make profit; the weakened coercive power of the aristocracy to extract peasant surpluses encouraged them to try better methods; and the tenants also had incentive to improve their methods in order to flourish in a competitive labor market. Terms of rent for land were becoming subject to economic market forces rather than to the previous stagnant system of custom and feudal obligation.[38][39]
By the early 17th century, England was a centralized state in which much of the feudal order of Medieval Europe had been swept away. This centralization was strengthened by a good system of roads and by a disproportionately large capital city, London. The capital acted as a central market hub for the entire country, creating a very large internal market for goods, contrasting with the fragmented feudal holdings that prevailed in most parts of the Continent.
A painting of a French seaport from 1638 at the height of mercantilism
The economic doctrine prevailing from the 16th to the 18th centuries is commonly called mercantilism.[40][41] This period, the Age of Discovery, was associated with the geographic exploration of the foreign lands by merchant traders, especially from England and the Low Countries. Mercantilism was a system of trade for profit, although commodities were still largely produced by non-capitalist methods.[42] Most scholars consider the era of merchant capitalism and mercantilism as the origin of modern capitalism,[43][44] although Karl Polanyi argued that the hallmark of capitalism is the establishment of generalized markets for what he called the “fictitious commodities”, i.e. land, labor and money. Accordingly, he argued that “not until 1834 was a competitive labor market established in England, hence industrial capitalism as a social system cannot be said to have existed before that date”.[45]
England began a large-scale and integrative approach to mercantilism during the Elizabethan Era (1558–1603). A systematic and coherent explanation of balance of trade was made public through Thomas Mun‘s argument England’s Treasure by Forraign Trade, or the Balance of our Forraign Trade is The Rule of Our Treasure. It was written in the 1620s and published in 1664.[46]
European merchants, backed by state controls, subsidies and monopolies, made most of their profits by buying and selling goods. In the words of Francis Bacon, the purpose of mercantilism was “the opening and well-balancing of trade; the cherishing of manufacturers; the banishing of idleness; the repressing of waste and excess by sumptuary laws; the improvement and husbanding of the soil; the regulation of prices…”.[47]
The British East India Company and the Dutch East India Company inaugurated an expansive era of commerce and trade.[48][49] These companies were characterized by their colonial and expansionary powers given to them by nation-states.[48] During this era, merchants, who had traded under the previous stage of mercantilism, invested capital in the East India Companies and other colonies, seeking a return on investment.
In the mid-18th century, a new group of economic theorists, led by David Hume[51] and Adam Smith, challenged fundamental mercantilist doctrines such as the belief that the world’s wealth remained constant and that a state could only increase its wealth at the expense of another state.
During the Industrial Revolution, industrialists replaced merchants as a dominant factor in the capitalist system and affected the decline of the traditional handicraft skills of artisans, guilds and journeymen. Also during this period, the surplus generated by the rise of commercial agriculture encouraged increased mechanization of agriculture. Industrial capitalism marked the development of the factory system of manufacturing, characterized by a complex division of labor between and within work process and the routine of work tasks; and finally established the global domination of the capitalist mode of production.[41]
This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (February 2017)
The gold standard formed the financial basis of the international economy from 1870 to 1914
Capitalism was carried across the world by broader processes of globalization and by the beginning of the nineteenth century a series of loosely connected market systems had come together as a relatively integrated global system, in turn intensifying processes of economic and other globalization.[53][page needed] Later in the 20th century, capitalism overcame a challenge by centrally-planned economies and is now the encompassing system worldwide,[16][54] with the mixed economy being its dominant form in the industrialized Western world.
Industrialization allowed cheap production of household items using economies of scale while rapid population growth created sustained demand for commodities. Globalization in this period was decisively shaped by 18th-century imperialism.[53][page needed]
After the First and Second Opium Wars and the completion of British conquest of India, vast populations of these regions became ready consumers of European exports. Also in this period, areas of sub-Saharan Africa and the Pacific islands were colonised. The conquest of new parts of the globe, notably sub-Saharan Africa, by Europeans yielded valuable natural resources such as rubber, diamonds and coal and helped fuel trade and investment between the European imperial powers, their colonies and the United States:
The inhabitant of London could order by telephone, sipping his morning tea, the various products of the whole earth, and reasonably expect their early delivery upon his doorstep. Militarism and imperialism of racial and cultural rivalries were little more than the amusements of his daily newspaper. What an extraordinary episode in the economic progress of man was that age which came to an end in August 1914.[55]
In the period following the global depression of the 1930s, the state played an increasingly prominent role in the capitalistic system throughout much of the world. The postwar boom ended in the late 1960s and early 1970s and the situation was worsened by the rise of stagflation.[57]Monetarism, a modification of Keynesianism that is more compatible with laissez-faire, gained increasing prominence in the capitalist world, especially under the leadership of Ronald Reagan in the United States and Margaret Thatcher in the United Kingdom in the 1980s. Public and political interest began shifting away from the so-called collectivist concerns of Keynes’s managed capitalism to a focus on individual choice, called “remarketized capitalism”.[58]
According to Harvard academic Shoshana Zuboff, a new genus of capitalism, surveillance capitalism, monetizes data acquired through surveillance.[59][60][61] She states it was first discovered and consolidated at Google, emerged due to the “coupling of the vast powers of the digital with the radical indifference and intrinsic narcissism of the financial capitalism and its neoliberal vision that have dominated commerce for at least three decades, especially in the Anglo economies”[60] and depends on the global architecture of computer mediation which produces a distributed and largely uncontested new expression of power she calls “Big Other”.[62]
Relationship to democracy
Many analysts[who?] assert that China is one of the main examples of state capitalism in the 21st century
The relationship between democracy and capitalism is a contentious area in theory and in popular political movements. The extension of universal adult male suffrage in 19th-century Britain occurred along with the development of industrial capitalism and democracy became widespread at the same time as capitalism, leading capitalists to posit a causal or mutual relationship between them.[63] However, according to some authors in the 20th-century, capitalism also accompanied a variety of political formations quite distinct from liberal democracies, including fascist regimes, absolute monarchies and single-party states.[41] Democratic peace theory asserts that democracies seldom fight other democracies, but critics of that theory suggest that this may be because of political similarity or stability rather than because they are democratic or capitalist. Moderate critics argue that though economic growth under capitalism has led to democracy in the past, it may not do so in the future as authoritarian regimes have been able to manage economic growth without making concessions to greater political freedom.[64][65]
Milton Friedman, one of the biggest supporters of the idea that capitalism promotes political freedom, argued that competitive capitalism allows economic and political power to be separate, ensuring that they do not clash with one another. Moderate critics have recently challenged this, stating that the current influence lobbying groups have had on policy in the United States is a contradiction, given the approval of Citizens United. This has led people to question the idea that competitive capitalism promotes political freedom. The ruling on Citizens United allows corporations to spend undisclosed and unregulated amounts of money on political campaigns, shifting outcomes to the interests and undermining true democracy. As explained in Robin Hahnel’s writings, the centerpiece of the ideological defense of the free market system is the concept of economic freedom and that supporters equate economic democracy with economic freedom and claim that only the free market system can provide economic freedom. According to Hahnel, there are a few objections to the premise that capitalism offers freedom through economic freedom. These objections are guided by critical questions about who or what decides whose freedoms are more protected. Often, the question of inequality is brought up when discussing how well capitalism promotes democracy. An argument that could stand is that economic growth can lead to inequality given that capital can be acquired at different rates by different people. In Capital in the Twenty-First Century, Thomas Piketty of the Paris School of Economics asserts that inequality is the inevitable consequence of economic growth in a capitalist economy and the resulting concentration of wealth can destabilize democratic societies and undermine the ideals of social justice upon which they are built.[66]
States with capitalistic economic systems have thrived under political regimes deemed to be authoritarian or oppressive. Singapore has a successful open market economy as a result of its competitive, business-friendly climate and robust rule of law. Nonetheless, it often comes under fire for its brand of government which though democratic and consistently one of the least corrupt[67] it also operates largely under a one-party rule and does not vigorously defend freedom of expression given its government-regulated press as well as penchant for upholding laws protecting ethnic and religious harmony, judicial dignity and personal reputation. The private (capitalist) sector in the People’s Republic of China has grown exponentially and thrived since its inception, despite having an authoritarian government. Augusto Pinochet‘s rule in Chile led to economic growth and high levels of inequality[68] by using authoritarian means to create a safe environment for investment and capitalism. Similarly, Suharto‘s authoritarian reign and extirpation of the Communist Party of Indonesia allowed for the expansion of capitalism in Indonesia.[69][70]
Varieties of capitalism
Peter A. Hall and David Soskice argued that modern economies have developed two different forms of capitalism: liberal market economies (or LME) (e.g. the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, New Zealand and Ireland) and coordinated market economies (CME) (e.g. Germany, Japan, Sweden and Austria). Those two types can be distinguished by the primary way in which firms coordinate with each other and other actors, such as trade unions. In LMEs, firms primarily coordinate their endeavors by way of hierarchies and market mechanisms. Coordinated market economies more heavily rely on non-market forms of interaction in the coordination of their relationship with other actors (for a detailed description see Varieties of Capitalism). These two forms of capitalisms developed different industrial relations, vocational training and education, corporate governance, inter-firm relations and relations with employees. The existence of these different forms of capitalism has important societal effects, especially in periods of crisis and instability. Since the early 2000s, the number of labor market outsiders has rapidly grown in Europe, especially among the youth, potentially influencing social and political participation. Using varieties of capitalism theory, it is possible to disentangle the different effects on social and political participation that an increase of labor market outsiders has in liberal and coordinated market economies (Ferragina et al., 2016).[71] The social and political disaffection, especially among the youth, seems to be more pronounced in liberal than coordinated market economies. This signals an important problem for liberal market economies in a period of crisis. If the market does not provide consistent job opportunities (as it has in previous decades), the shortcomings of liberal social security systems may depress social and political participation even further than in other capitalist economies.
In general, capitalism as an economic system and mode of production can be summarised by the following:[72]
Capital accumulation:[73] production for profit and accumulation as the implicit purpose of all or most of production, constriction or elimination of production formerly carried out on a common social or private household basis.[74]
The use of the price mechanism to allocate resources between competing uses.[10]
Economically efficient use of the factors of production and raw materials due to maximization of value added in the production process.[77][78]
Freedom of capitalists to act in their self-interest in managing their business and investments.[79]
The market
The price (P) of a product is determined by a balance between production at each price (supply, S) and the desires of those with purchasing power at each price (demand, D): this results in a market equilibrium, with a given quantity (Q) sold of the product, whereas a rise in demand would result in an increase in price and an increase in output
In free market and laissez-faire forms of capitalism, markets are used most extensively with minimal or no regulation over the pricing mechanism. In mixed economies, which are almost universal today,[80] markets continue to play a dominant role, but they are regulated to some extent by the state in order to correct market failures, promote social welfare, conserve natural resources, fund defense and public safety or other rationale. In state capitalist systems, markets are relied upon the least, with the state relying heavily on state-owned enterprises or indirect economic planning to accumulate capital.
Supply is the amount of a good or service that is available for purchase or sale. Demand is the measure of value for a good that people are willing to buy at a given time. Prices tend to rise when demand for an available resource increases or its supply diminishes and fall with demand or when supply increases.
Competition arises when more than one producer is trying to sell the same or similar products to the same buyers. In capitalist theory, competition leads to innovation and more affordable prices. Without competition, a monopoly or cartel may develop. A monopoly occurs when a firm is granted exclusivity over a market. Hence the firm can engage in rent seeking behaviors such as limiting output and raising prices because it has no fear of competition. A cartel is a group of firms that act together in a monopolistic manner to control output and prices.
Governments have implemented legislation for the purpose of preventing the creation of monopolies and cartels. In 1890, the Sherman Anti-Trust Act became the first legislation passed by the United States Congress to limit monopolies.[81]
The profit motive, in the theory in capitalism, is the desire to earn income in the form of profit. Stated differently, the reason for a business’s existence is to turn a profit. The profit motive functions according to rational choice theory, or the theory that individuals tend to pursue what is in their own best interests. Accordingly, businesses seek to benefit themselves and/or their shareholders by maximizing profit.
In capitalist theoretics, the profit motive is said to ensure that resources are being allocated efficiently. For instance, Austrian economistHenry Hazlitt explains: “If there is no profit in making an article, it is a sign that the labor and capital devoted to its production are misdirected: the value of the resources that must be used up in making the article is greater than the value of the article itself”.[82] In other words, profits let companies know whether an item is worth producing. Theoretically, in free and competitive markets maximising profit ensures that resources are not wasted.
The relationship between the state, its formal mechanisms and capitalist societies has been debated in many fields of social and political theory, with active discussion since the 19th century. Hernando de Soto is a contemporary Peruvian economist who has argued that an important characteristic of capitalism is the functioning state protection of property rights in a formal property system where ownership and transactions are clearly recorded.[83]
According to de Soto, this is the process by which physical assets are transformed into capital, which in turn may be used in many more ways and much more efficiently in the market economy. A number of Marxian economists have argued that the Enclosure Acts in England and similar legislation elsewhere were an integral part of capitalist primitive accumulation and that specific legal frameworks of private land ownership have been integral to the development of capitalism.[84][85]
In capitalist economics, market competition is the rivalry among sellers trying to achieve such goals as increasing profits, market share and sales volume by varying the elements of the marketing mix: price, product, distribution and promotion. Merriam-Webster defines competition in business as “the effort of two or more parties acting independently to secure the business of a third party by offering the most favourable terms”.[86] It was described by Adam Smith in The Wealth of Nations (1776) and later economists as allocating productive resources to their most highly valued uses[87] and encouraging efficiency. Smith and other classical economists before Antoine Augustine Cournot were referring to price and non-price rivalry among producers to sell their goods on best terms by bidding of buyers, not necessarily to a large number of sellers nor to a market in final equilibrium.[88] Competition is widespread throughout the market process. It is a condition where “buyers tend to compete with other buyers, and sellers tend to compete with other sellers”.[89] In offering goods for exchange, buyers competitively bid to purchase specific quantities of specific goods which are available, or might be available if sellers were to choose to offer such goods. Similarly, sellers bid against other sellers in offering goods on the market, competing for the attention and exchange resources of buyers. Competition results from scarcity—there is never enough to satisfy all conceivable human wants—and occurs “when people strive to meet the criteria that are being used to determine who gets what”.[89]
Economic growth
World’s GDP per capita shows exponential growth since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution[90]
Capitalism and the economy of the People’s Republic of China
Historically, capitalism has an ability to promote economic growth as measured by gross domestic product (GDP), capacity utilization or standard of living. This argument was central, for example, to Adam Smith’s advocacy of letting a free market control production and price and allocate resources. Many theorists have noted that this increase in global GDP over time coincides with the emergence of the modern world capitalist system.[91][92]
Between 1000 and 1820, the world economy grew sixfold, a faster rate than the population growth, so individuals enjoyed, on average, a 50% increase in income. Between 1820 and 1998, world economy grew 50-fold, a much faster rate than the population growth, so individuals enjoyed on average a 9-fold increase in income.[93] Over this period, in Europe, North America and Australasia the economy grew 19-fold per person, even though these regions already had a higher starting level; and in Japan, which was poor in 1820, the increase per person was 31-fold. In the Third World, there was an increase, but only 5-fold per person.[93]
The capitalist mode of production refers to the systems of organising production and distribution within capitalist societies. Private money-making in various forms (renting, banking, merchant trade, production for profit and so on) preceded the development of the capitalist mode of production as such. The capitalist mode of production proper based on wage-labour and private ownership of the means of production and on industrial technology began to grow rapidly in Western Europe from the Industrial Revolution, later extending to most of the world.[citation needed]
Capitalism in the form of money-making activity has existed in the shape of merchants and money-lenders who acted as intermediaries between consumers and producers engaging in simple commodity production (hence the reference to “merchant capitalism“) since the beginnings of civilisation. What is specific about the “capitalist mode of production” is that most of the inputs and outputs of production are supplied through the market (i.e. they are commodities) and essentially all production is in this mode.[10] For example, in flourishing feudalism most or all of the factors of production including labour are owned by the feudal ruling class outright and the products may also be consumed without a market of any kind, it is production for use within the feudal social unit and for limited trade.[73] This has the important consequence that the whole organisation of the production process is reshaped and re-organised to conform with economic rationality as bounded by capitalism, which is expressed in price relationships between inputs and outputs (wages, non-labour factor costs, sales and profits) rather than the larger rational context faced by society overall—that is, the whole process is organised and re-shaped in order to conform to “commercial logic”. Essentially, capital accumulation comes to define economic rationality in capitalist production.[74]
A society, region or nation is capitalist if the predominant source of incomes and products being distributed is capitalist activity, but even so this does not yet mean necessarily that the capitalist mode of production is dominant in that society.
The price P of a product is determined by a balance between production at each price (supply S) and the desires of those with purchasing power at each price (demand D): the diagram shows a positive shift in demand from D1 to D2, resulting in an increase in price (P) and quantity sold (Q) of the product
In capitalist economic structures, supply and demand is an economic model of price determination in a market. It concludes that in a competitive market, the unit price for a particular good will vary until it settles at a point where the quantity demanded by consumers (at the current price) will equal the quantity supplied by producers (at the current price), resulting in an economic equilibrium for price and quantity.
If demand increases (demand curve shifts to the right) and supply remains unchanged, then a shortage occurs, leading to a higher equilibrium price.
If demand decreases (demand curve shifts to the left) and supply remains unchanged, then a surplus occurs, leading to a lower equilibrium price.
If demand remains unchanged and supply increases (supply curve shifts to the right), then a surplus occurs, leading to a lower equilibrium price.
If demand remains unchanged and supply decreases (supply curve shifts to the left), then a shortage occurs, leading to a higher equilibrium price.
Graphical representation of supply and demand
Although it is normal to regard the quantity demanded and the quantity supplied as functions of the price of the goods, the standard graphical representation, usually attributed to Alfred Marshall, has price on the vertical axis and quantity on the horizontal axis, the opposite of the standard convention for the representation of a mathematical function.
Since determinants of supply and demand other than the price of the goods in question are not explicitly represented in the supply-demand diagram, changes in the values of these variables are represented by moving the supply and demand curves (often described as “shifts” in the curves). By contrast, responses to changes in the price of the good are represented as movements along unchanged supply and demand curves.
Supply schedule
A supply schedule is a table that shows the relationship between the price of a good and the quantity supplied. Under the assumption of perfect competition, supply is determined by marginal cost. That is: firms will produce additional output while the cost of producing an extra unit of output is less than the price they would receive.
A hike in the cost of raw goods would decrease supply and shifting costs up while a discount would increase supply, shifting costs down and hurting producers as producer surplus decreases.
By its very nature, conceptualising a supply curve requires the firm to be a perfect competitor (i.e. to have no influence over the market price). This is true because each point on the supply curve is the answer to the question “If this firm is faced with this potential price, how much output will it be able to and willing to sell?”. If a firm has market power, its decision of how much output to provide to the market influences the market price, therefore the firm is not “faced with” any price and the question becomes less relevant.
Economists distinguish between the supply curve of an individual firm and between the market supply curve. The market supply curve is obtained by summing the quantities supplied by all suppliers at each potential price, thus in the graph of the supply curve individual firms’ supply curves are added horizontally to obtain the market supply curve.
Economists also distinguish the short-run market supply curve from the long-run market supply curve. In this context, two things are assumed constant by definition of the short run: the availability of one or more fixed inputs (typically physical capital) and the number of firms in the industry. In the long-run, firms can adjust their holdings of physical capital, enabling them to better adjust their quantity supplied at any given price. Furthermore, in the long-run potential competitors can enter or exit the industry in response to market conditions. For both of these reasons, long-run market supply curves are generally flatter than their short-run counterparts.
The determinants of supply are:
Production costs: how much a goods costs to be produced. Production costs are the cost of the inputs; primarily labor, capital, energy and materials. They depend on the technology used in production and/or technological advances. See productivity.
Firms’ expectations about future prices.
Number of suppliers.
Demand schedule
A demand schedule, depicted graphically as the demand curve, represents the amount of some goods that buyers are willing and able to purchase at various prices, assuming all determinants of demand other than the price of the good in question, such as income, tastes and preferences, the price of substitute goods and the price of complementary goods, remain the same. According to the law of demand, the demand curve is almost always represented as downward-sloping, meaning that as price decreases, consumers will buy more of the good.[96]
Just like the supply curves reflect marginal cost curves, demand curves are determined by marginal utility curves.[97] Consumers will be willing to buy a given quantity of a good at a given price, if the marginal utility of additional consumption is equal to the opportunity cost determined by the price—that is, the marginal utility of alternative consumption choices. The demand schedule is defined as the willingness and ability of a consumer to purchase a given product in a given frame of time.
While the aforementioned demand curve is generally downward-sloping, there may be rare examples of goods that have upward-sloping demand curves. Two different hypothetical types of goods with upward-sloping demand curves are Giffen goods (an inferior, but staple good) and Veblen goods (goods made more fashionable by a higher price).
By its very nature, conceptualising a demand curve requires that the purchaser be a perfect competitor—that is, that the purchaser has no influence over the market price. This is true because each point on the demand curve is the answer to the question “If this buyer is faced with this potential price, how much of the product will it purchase?”. If a buyer has market power, so its decision of how much to buy influences the market price, then the buyer is not “faced with” any price and the question is meaningless.
Like with supply curves, economists distinguish between the demand curve of an individual and the market demand curve. The market demand curve is obtained by summing the quantities demanded by all consumers at each potential price, thus in the graph of the demand curve individuals’ demand curves are added horizontally to obtain the market demand curve.
The determinants of demand are:
Income.
Tastes and preferences.
Prices of related goods and services.
Consumers’ expectations about future prices and incomes that can be checked.
In the context of supply and demand, economic equilibrium refers to a state where economic forces such as supply and demand are balanced and in the absence of external influences the (equilibrium) values of economic variables will not change. For example, in the standard text-book model of perfect competition equilibrium occurs at the point at which quantity demanded and quantity supplied are equal.[98] Market equilibrium in this case refers to a condition where a market price is established through competition such that the amount of goods or services sought by buyers is equal to the amount of goods or services produced by sellers. This price is often called the competitive price or market clearing price and will tend not to change unless demand or supply changes and the quantity is called “competitive quantity” or market clearing quantity.
Partial equilibrium, as the name suggests, takes into consideration only a part of the market to attain equilibrium.
Jain proposes (attributed to George Stigler): “A partial equilibrium is one which is based on only a restricted range of data, a standard example is price of a single product, the prices of all other products being held fixed during the analysis”.[99]
The supply and demand model is a partial equilibrium model of economic equilibrium, where the clearance on the market of some specific goods is obtained independently from prices and quantities in other markets. In other words, the prices of all substitutes and complements as well as income levels of consumers are constant. This makes analysis much simpler than in a general equilibrium model which includes an entire economy.
Here the dynamic process is that prices adjust until supply equals demand. It is a powerfully simple technique that allows one to study equilibrium, efficiency and comparative statics. The stringency of the simplifying assumptions inherent in this approach make the model considerably more tractable, but it may produce results which while seemingly precise do not effectively model real world economic phenomena.
Partial equilibrium analysis examines the effects of policy action in creating equilibrium only in that particular sector or market which is directly affected, ignoring its effect in any other market or industry assuming that they being small will have little impact if any.
Hence this analysis is considered to be useful in constricted markets.
Léon Walras first formalised the idea of a one-period economic equilibrium of the general economic system, but it was French economist Antoine Augustin Cournot and English political economist Alfred Marshall who developed tractable models to analyse an economic system.
Empirical estimation
Demand and supply relations in a market can be statistically estimated from price, quantity and other data with sufficient information in the model. This can be done with simultaneous-equation methods of estimation in econometrics. Such methods allow solving for the model-relevant “structural coefficients”, the estimated algebraic counterparts of the theory. The parameter identification problem is a common issue in “structural estimation”. Typically, data on exogenous variables (that is, variables other than price and quantity, both of which are endogenous variables) are needed to perform such an estimation. An alternative to “structural estimation” is reduced-form estimation, which regresses each of the endogenous variables on the respective exogenous variables.
According to Hamid S. Hosseini, the power of supply and demand was understood to some extent by several early Muslim scholars, such as fourteenth-century Mamluk scholar Ibn Taymiyyah, who wrote: “If desire for goods increases while its availability decreases, its price rises. On the other hand, if availability of the good increases and the desire for it decreases, the price comes down”.[100]
John Locke‘s 1691 work Some Considerations on the Consequences of the Lowering of Interest and the Raising of the Value of Money[101] includes an early and clear description of supply and demand and their relationship. In this description, demand is rent: “The price of any commodity rises or falls by the proportion of the number of buyer and sellers” and “that which regulates the price… [of goods] is nothing else but their quantity in proportion to their rent”.
In The Wealth of Nations, Smith generally assumed that the supply price was fixed, but that its “merit” (value) would decrease as its “scarcity” increased, in effect what was later called the law of demand also. In Principles of Political Economy and Taxation, Ricardo more rigorously laid down the idea of the assumptions that were used to build his ideas of supply and demand. Antoine Augustin Cournot first developed a mathematical model of supply and demand in his 1838 Researches into the Mathematical Principles of Wealth, including diagrams.
During the late 19th century, the marginalist school of thought emerged. This field mainly was started by Stanley Jevons, Carl Menger and Léon Walras. The key idea was that the price was set by the most expensive price—that is, the price at the margin. This was a substantial change from Adam Smith’s thoughts on determining the supply price.
In his 1870 essay “On the Graphical Representation of Supply and Demand”, Fleeming Jenkin in the course of “introduc[ing] the diagrammatic method into the English economic literature” published the first drawing of supply and demand curves therein,[103] including comparative statics from a shift of supply or demand and application to the labor market.[104] The model was further developed and popularized by Alfred Marshall in the 1890 textbook Principles of Economics.[102]
In a capitalist system, the government does not prohibit private property or prevent individuals from working where they please. The government does not prevent firms from determining what wages they will pay and what prices they will charge for their products. However, many countries have minimum wage laws and minimum safety standards.
Under some versions of capitalism, the government carries out a number of economic functions, such as issuing money, supervising public utilities and enforcing private contracts. Many countries have competition laws that prohibit monopolies and cartels from forming. Despite anti-monopoly laws, large corporations can form near-monopolies in some industries. Such firms can temporarily drop prices and accept losses to prevent competition from entering the market and then raise them again once the threat of entry is reduced. In many countries, public utilities (e.g. electricity, heating fuel and communications) are able to operate as a monopoly under government regulation due to high economies of scale.
Government agencies regulate the standards of service in many industries, such as airlines and broadcasting as well as financing a wide range of programs. In addition, the government regulates the flow of capital and uses financial tools such as the interest rate to control factors such as inflation and unemployment.[105]
Relationship to political freedom
In his book The Road to Serfdom, Friedrich Hayek asserts that the economic freedom of capitalism is a requisite of political freedom. He argues that the market mechanism is the only way of deciding what to produce and how to distribute the items without using coercion. Milton Friedman, Andrew Brennan and Ronald Reagan also promoted this view. Friedman claimed that centralized economic operations are always accompanied by political repression. In his view, transactions in a market economy are voluntary and that the wide diversity that voluntary activity permits is a fundamental threat to repressive political leaders and greatly diminish their power to coerce. Some of Friedman’s views were shared by John Maynard Keynes, who believed that capitalism is vital for freedom to survive and thrive.[106][107]Freedom House, an American think tank that conducts international research on and advocates for, democracy, political freedom and human rights, has argued “there is a high and statistically significant correlation between the level of political freedom as measured by Freedom House and economic freedom as measured by the Wall Street Journal/Heritage Foundation survey“.[108]
Types of capitalism
There are many variants of capitalism in existence that differ according to country and region. They vary in their institutional makeup and by their economic policies. The common features among all the different forms of capitalism is that they are based on the production of goods and services for profit, predominantly market-based allocation of resources and they are structured upon the accumulation of capital. The major forms of capitalism are listed hereafter:
Advanced capitalism is the situation that pertains to a society in which the capitalist model has been integrated and developed deeply and extensively for a prolonged period. Various writers identify Antonio Gramsci as an influential early theorist of advanced capitalism, even if he did not use the term himself. In his writings, Gramsci sought to explain how capitalism had adapted to avoid the revolutionary overthrow that had seemed inevitable in the 19th century. At the heart of his explanation was the decline of raw coercion as a tool of class power, replaced by use of civil society institutions to manipulate public ideology in the capitalists’ favour.[109][110][111]
Jürgen Habermas has been a major contributor to the analysis of advanced-capitalistic societies. Habermas observed four general features that characterise advanced capitalism:
Concentration of industrial activity in a few large firms.
Constant reliance on the state to stabilise the economic system.
A formally democratic government that legitimises the activities of the state and dissipates opposition to the system.
The use of nominal wage increases to pacify the most restless segments of the work force.[112]
Rudolf Hilferding is credited[by whom?] with first bringing the term “finance capitalism” into prominence through Finance Capital, his 1910 study of the links between German trusts, banks and monopolies—a study subsumed by Vladimir Lenin into Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism (1917), his analysis of the imperialist relations of the great world powers.[115] Lenin concluded that the banks at that time operated as “the chief nerve centres of the whole capitalist system of national economy”.[116] For the Comintern (founded in 1919), the phrase “dictatorship of finance capitalism”[117] became a regular one.
Fernnand Braudel would later point to two earlier periods when finance capitalism had emerged in human history—with the Genoese in the 16th century and with the Dutch in the 17th and 18th centuries—although at those points it developed from commercial capitalism.[118][need quotation to verify]Giovanni Arrighi extended Braudel’s analysis to suggest that a predominance of finance capitalism is a recurring, long-term phenomenon, whenever a previous phase of commercial/industrial capitalist expansion reaches a plateau.[119]
The subscription room at Lloyd’s of London in the early 19th century
Mercantilism is a nationalist form of early capitalism that came into existence approximately in the late 16th century. It is characterized by the intertwining of national business interests to state-interest and imperialism; and consequently, the state apparatus is utilized to advance national business interests abroad. An example of this is colonists living in America who were only allowed to trade with and purchase goods from their respective mother countries (e.g. Britain, Portugal and France). Mercantilism was driven by the belief that the wealth of a nation is increased through a positive balance of trade with other nations—it corresponds to the phase of capitalist development sometimes called the primitive accumulation of capital.
Free market economy refers to a capitalist economic system where prices for goods and services are set freely by the forces of supply and demand and are allowed to reach their point of equilibrium without intervention by government policy. It typically entails support for highly competitive markets and private ownership of productive enterprises. Laissez-faire is a more extensive form of free market economy where the role of the state is limited to protecting property rights, or for plumbline anarcho-capitalists, property rights are protected by private firms and market-generated law.
A social market economy is a nominally free market system where government intervention in price formation is kept to a minimum, but the state provides significant services in the area of social security, unemployment benefits and recognition of labor rights through national collective bargaining arrangements. This model is prominent in Western and Northern European countries as well as Japan, albeit in slightly different configurations. The vast majority of enterprises are privately owned in this economic model.
Rhine capitalism refers to the contemporary model of capitalism and adaptation of the social market model that exists in continental Western Europe today.
State capitalism is a capitalist market economy dominated by state-owned enterprises, where the state enterprises are organized as commercial, profit-seeking businesses. The designation has been used broadly throughout the 20th century to designate a number of different economic forms, ranging from state-ownership in market economies to the command economies of the former Eastern Bloc. According to Aldo Musacchio, a professor at Harvard Business School, state capitalism is a system in which governments, whether democratic or autocratic, exercise a widespread influence on the economy either through direct ownership or various subsidies. Musacchio notes a number of differences between today’s state capitalism and its predecessors. In his opinion, gone are the days when governments appointed bureaucrats to run companies: the world’s largest state-owned enterprises are now traded on the public markets and kept in good health by large institutional investors. Contemporary state capitalism is associated with the East Asian model of capitalism, dirigisme and the economy of Norway.[120] Alternatively, Merriam-Webster defines state capitalism as “an economic system in which private capitalism is modified by a varying degree of government ownership and control”.[121]
In Socialism: Utopian and Scientific, Friedrich Engels argued that state-owned enterprises would characterize the final stage of capitalism, consisting of ownership and management of large-scale production and communication by the bourgeois state.[122] In his writings, Vladimir Lenin characterized the economy of Soviet Russia as state capitalist, believing state capitalism to be an early step toward the development of socialism.[123][124]
Some economists and left-wing academics including Richard D. Wolff and Noam Chomsky argue that the economies of the former Soviet Union and Eastern bloc represented a form of state capitalism because their internal organization within enterprises and the system of wage labor remained intact.[125][126][127]
The term is not used by Austrian School economists to describe state ownership of the means of production. The economist Ludwig von Mises argued that the designation of “state capitalism” was simply a new label for the old labels of “state socialism” and “planned economy” and differed only in non-essentials from these earlier designations.[128]
The debate between proponents of private versus state capitalism is centered around questions of managerial efficacy, productive efficiency and fair distribution of wealth.
A mixed economy is a largely market-based economy consisting of both private and public ownership of the means of production and economic interventionism through macroeconomic policies intended to correct market failures, reduce unemployment and keep inflation low. The degree of intervention in markets varies among different countries. Some mixed economies, such as France under dirigisme, also featured a degree of indirect economic planning over a largely capitalist-based economy.
Most modern capitalist economies are defined as “mixed economies” to some degree.[citation needed]
The accumulation of capital is the process of “making money”, or growing an initial sum of money through investment in production. Capitalism is based on the accumulation of capital, whereby financial capital is invested in order to make a profit and then reinvested into further production in a continuous process of accumulation. In Marxian economic theory, this dynamic is called the law of value. Capital accumulation forms the basis of capitalism, where economic activity is structured around the accumulation of capital, defined as investment in order to realize a financial profit.[129] In this context, “capital” is defined as money or a financial asset invested for the purpose of making more money (whether in the form of profit, rent, interest, royalties, capital gain or some other kind of return).[130]
Organisations such as the International Monetary Fund, the UNCTAD, the World Bank Group, the OECD and the Bank for International Settlements used national investment data to estimate world trends. The Bureau of Economic Analysis, Eurostat and the Japan Statistical Office provide data on the United States, Europe and Japan respectively. Other useful sources of investment information are business magazines such as Fortune, Forbes, The Economist, Business Week and so on as well as various corporate “watchdog” organisations and non-governmental organisation publications. A reputable scientific journal is the Review of Income & Wealth. In the case of the United States, the “Analytical Perspectives” document (an annex to the yearly budget) provides useful wealth and capital estimates applying to the whole country.
In Karl Marx‘ economic theory, capital accumulation refers to the operation whereby profits are reinvested increasing the total quantity of capital. Capital is viewed by Marx as expanding value, that is, in other terms, as a sum of capital, usually expressed in money, that is transformed through human labor into a larger value, extracted as profits and expressed as money. Here, capital is defined essentially as economic or commercial asset value in search of additional value or surplus-value. This requires property relations which enable objects of value to be appropriated and owned, and trading rights to be established. Capital accumulation has a double origin, namely in trade and in expropriation, both of a legal or illegal kind. The reason is that a stock of capital can be increased through a process of exchange or “trading up”, but also through directly taking an asset or resource from someone else without compensation. David Harvey calls this accumulation by dispossession.
The continuation and progress of capital accumulation depends on the removal of obstacles to the expansion of trade and this has historically often been a violent process. As markets expand, more and more new opportunities develop for accumulating capital because more and more types of goods and services can be traded in. However, capital accumulation may also confront resistance when people refuse to sell, or refuse to buy (for example a strike by investors or workers, or consumer resistance).
Concentration and centralisation
According to Marx, capital has the tendency for concentration and centralization in the hands of the wealthy. Marx explains: “It is concentration of capitals already formed, destruction of their individual independence, expropriation of capitalist by capitalist, transformation of many small into few large capitals. […] Capital grows in one place to a huge mass in a single hand, because it has in another place been lost by many. […] The battle of competition is fought by cheapening of commodities. The cheapness of commodities demands, caeteris paribus, on the productiveness of labour, and this again on the scale of production. Therefore, the larger capitals beat the smaller. It will further be remembered that, with the development of the capitalist mode of production, there is an increase in the minimum amount of individual capital necessary to carry on a business under its normal conditions. The smaller capitals, therefore, crowd into spheres of production which Modern Industry has only sporadically or incompletely got hold of. Here competition rages […] It always ends in the ruin of many small capitalists, whose capitals partly pass into the hands of their conquerors, partly vanish”.[131]
The rate of accumulation
In Marxian economics, the rate of accumulation is defined as (1) the value of the real net increase in the stock of capital in an accounting period; and (2) the proportion of realised surplus-value or profit-income which is reinvested, rather than consumed. This rate can be expressed by means of various ratios between the original capital outlay, the realised turnover, surplus-value or profit and reinvestments (e.g. the writings of the economist Michał Kalecki).
Other things being equal, the greater the amount of profit-income that is disbursed as personal earnings and used for consumptive purposes, the lower the savings rate and the lower the rate of accumulation is likely to be. However, earnings spent on consumption can also stimulate market demand and higher investment. This is the cause of endless controversies in economic theory about “how much to spend, and how much to save”.
In a boom period of capitalism, the growth of investments is cumulative, i.e. one investment leads to another, leading to a constantly expanding market, an expanding labor force and an increase in the standard of living for the majority of the people.[citation needed]
In a stagnating, decadent capitalism, the accumulation process is increasingly oriented towards investment on military and security forces, real estate, financial speculation and luxury consumption. In that case, income from value-adding production will decline in favour of interest, rent and tax income, with as a corollary an increase in the level of permanent unemployment. The more capital one owns, the more capital one can also borrow. The inverse is also true and this is one factor in the widening gap between the rich and the poor.[citation needed]
Ernest Mandel emphasised that the rhythm of capital accumulation and growth depended critically on (1) the division of a society’s social product between “necessary product” and “surplus product“; and (2) the division of the surplus product between investment and consumption. In turn, this allocation pattern reflected the outcome of competition among capitalists, competition between capitalists and workers and competition between workers. The pattern of capital accumulation can therefore never be simply explained by commercial factors as it also involved social factors and power relationships.
The circuit of capital accumulation from production
Strictly speaking, capital has accumulated only when realised profit income has been reinvested in capital assets. As suggested in the first volume of Marx’ Das Kapital, the process of capital accumulation in production has at least seven distinct but linked moments:
The valorisation (increase in value) of capital through production of new outputs.
The appropriation of the new output produced by employees, containing the added value.
The realisation of surplus-value through output sales.
The appropriation of realised surplus-value as (profit) income after deduction of costs.
The reinvestment of profit income in production.
All of these moments do not refer simply to an “economic” or commercial process. Rather, they assume the existence of legal, social, cultural and economic power conditions, without which creation, distribution and circulation of the new wealth could not occur. This becomes especially clear when the attempt is made to create a market where none exists, or where people refuse to trade.
Simple and expanded reproduction
In the second volume of Das Kapital, Marx continues the story and shows that with the aid of bank credit capital in search of growth can more or less smoothly mutate from one form to another, alternately taking the form of money capital (liquid deposits, securities and so on), commodity capital (tradable products, real estate and the like), or production capital (means of production and labor power).
His discussion of the simple and expanded reproduction of the conditions of production offers a more sophisticated model of the parameters of the accumulation process as a whole. At simple reproduction, a sufficient amount is produced to sustain society at the given living standard; the stock of capital stays constant. At expanded reproduction, more product-value is produced than is necessary to sustain society at a given living standard (a surplus product); the additional product-value is available for investments which enlarge the scale and variety of production.
The bourgeois claim there is no economic law according to which capital is necessarily re-invested in the expansion of production, that such depends on anticipated profitability, market expectations and perceptions of investment risk. Such statements only explain the subjective experiences of investors and ignore the objective realities which would influence such opinions. As Marx states in the second volume of Das Kapital, simple reproduction only exists if the variable and surplus capital realised by Dept. 1—producers of means of production—exactly equals that of the constant capital of Dept. 2, producers of articles of consumption (p. 524). Such equilibrium rests on various assumptions, such as a constant labor supply (no population growth). Accumulation does not imply a necessary change in total magnitude of value produced, but can simply refer to a change in the composition of an industry (p. 514).
Ernest Mandel introduced the additional concept of contracted economic reproduction, i.e. reduced accumulation where business operating at a loss outnumbers growing business, or economic reproduction on a decreasing scale, for example due to wars, natural disasters or devalorisation.
Balanced economic growth requires that different factors in the accumulation process expand in appropriate proportions. However, markets themselves cannot spontaneously create that balance and in fact what drives business activity is precisely the imbalances between supply and demand: inequality is the motor of growth. This partly explains why the worldwide pattern of economic growth is very uneven and unequal, even although markets have existed almost everywhere for a very long-time. Some people argue that it also explains government regulation of market trade and protectionism.
Capital accumulation as social relation
“Accumulation of capital” sometimes also refers in Marxist writings to the reproduction of capitalist social relations (institutions) on a larger scale over time, i.e. the expansion of the size of the proletariat and of the wealth owned by the bourgeoisie.
This interpretation emphasises that capital ownership, predicated on command over labor, is a social relation: the growth of capital implies the growth of the working class (a “law of accumulation“). In the first volume of Das Kapital, Marx had illustrated this idea with reference to Edward Gibbon Wakefield‘s theory of colonisation:
Wakefield discovered that in the Colonies, property in money, means of subsistence, machines, and other means of production, does not as yet stamp a man as a capitalist if there be wanting the correlative—the wage-worker, the other man who is compelled to sell himself of his own free-will. He discovered that capital is not a thing, but a social relation between persons, established by the instrumentality of things. Mr. Peel, he moans, took with him from England to Swan River, West Australia, means of subsistence and of production to the amount of £50,000. Mr. Peel had the foresight to bring with him, besides, 3,000 persons of the working-class, men, women, and children. Once arrived at his destination, ‘Mr. Peel was left without a servant to make his bed or fetch him water from the river.’ Unhappy Mr. Peel, who provided for everything except the export of English modes of production to Swan River!
— Das Kapital, vol. 1, ch. 33
In the third volume of Das Kapital, Marx refers to the “fetishism of capital” reaching its highest point with interest-bearing capital because now capital seems to grow of its own accord without anybody doing anything:
The relations of capital assume their most externalised and most fetish-like form in interest-bearing capital. We have here M − M ′ {\displaystyle M-M’} , money creating more money, self-expanding value, without the process that effectuates these two extremes. In merchant’s capital, M − C − M ′ {\displaystyle M-C-M’} , there is at least the general form of the capitalistic movement, although it confines itself solely to the sphere of circulation, so that profit appears merely as profit derived from alienation; but it is at least seen to be the product of a social relation, not the product of a mere thing. […] This is obliterated in M − M ′ {\displaystyle M-M’} , the form of interest-bearing capital. […] The thing (money, commodity, value) is now capital even as a mere thing, and capital appears as a mere thing. The result of the entire process of reproduction appears as a property inherent in the thing itself. It depends on the owner of the money, i.e., of the commodity in its continually exchangeable form, whether he wants to spend it as money or loan it out as capital. In interest-bearing capital, therefore, this automatic fetish, self-expanding value, money generating money, are brought out in their pure state and in this form it no longer bears the birth-marks of its origin. The social relation is consummated in the relation of a thing, of money, to itself. Instead of the actual transformation of money into capital, we see here only form without content.
Wage labour refers to the sale of labour under a formal or informal employment contract to an employer.[132] These transactions usually occur in a labour market where wages are market determined.[133] Individuals who possess and supply financial capital or labor to productive ventures often become owners, either jointly (as shareholders) or individually. In Marxist economics, these owners of the means of production and suppliers of capital are generally called capitalists. The description of the role of the capitalist has shifted, first referring to a useless intermediary between producers to an employer of producers and eventually came to refer to owners of the means of production.[134]Labor includes all physical and mental human resources, including entrepreneurial capacity and management skills, which are needed to produce products and services. Production is the act of making goods or services by applying labor power.[135][136]
Critics of the capitalist mode of production see wage labour as a major, if not defining, aspect of hierarchical industrial systems. Most opponents of the institution support worker self-management and economic democracy as alternatives to both wage labour and to capitalism. While most opponents of the wage system blame the capitalist owners of the means of production for its existence, most anarchists and other libertarian socialists also hold the state as equally responsible as it exists as a tool utilised by capitalists to subsidise themselves and protect the institution of private ownership of the means of production. As some opponents of wage labour take influence from Marxist propositions, many are opposed to private property, but maintain respect for personal property.
Types
The most common form of wage labour currently is ordinary direct, or “full-time”, employment in which a free worker sells his or her labour for an indeterminate time (from a few years to the entire career of the worker) in return for a money-wage or salary and a continuing relationship with the employer which it does not in general offer contractors or other irregular staff. However, wage labour takes many other forms and explicit as opposed to implicit (i.e. conditioned by local labour and tax law) contracts are not uncommon. Economic history shows a great variety of ways in which labour is traded and exchanged. The differences show up in the form of:
Employment status: a worker could be employed full-time, part-time, or on a casual basis. He or she could be employed for example temporarily for a specific project only, or on a permanent basis. Part-time wage labour could combine with part-time self-employment. The worker could be employed also as an apprentice.
Civil (legal) status: the worker could for example be a free citizen, an indentured labourer, the subject of forced labour (including some prison or army labour); a worker could be assigned by the political authorities to a task, they could be a semi-slave or a serf bound to the land who is hired out part of the time. So the labour might be performed on a more or less voluntary basis, or on a more or less involuntary basis, in which there are many gradations.
Method of payment (remuneration or compensation): the work done could be paid “in cash” (a money-wage) or “in kind” (through receiving goods and/or services), or in the form of “piece rates” where the wage is directly dependent on how much the worker produces. In some cases, the worker might be paid in the form of credit used to buy goods and services, or in the form of stock options or shares in an enterprise.
Method of hiring: the worker might engage in a labour-contract on his or her own initiative, or he or she might hire out their labour as part of a group. However, he or she may also hire out their labour via an intermediary (such as an employment agency) to a third party. In this case, he or she is paid by the intermediary, but works for a third party which pays the intermediary. In some cases, labour is subcontracted several times, with several intermediaries. Another possibility is that the worker is assigned or posted to a job by a political authority, or that an agency hires out a worker to an enterprise together with the means of production.
Effects of war
The common view among economic historians is that the Great Depression ended with the advent of World War II (assembling the North American B-25 Mitchell at Kansas City, 1942)
War typically causes the diversion, destruction and creation of capital assets as capital assets are both destroyed or consumed and diverted to types of production needed to fight the war. Many assets are wasted and in some few cases created specifically to fight a war. War driven demands may be a powerful stimulus for the accumulation of capital and production capability in limited areas and market expansion outside the immediate theatre of war. Often this has induced laws against perceived and real war profiteering.
The total hours worked in the United States rose by 34 percent during World War II, even though the military draft reduced the civilian labor force by 11 percent.[137]
War destruction can be illustrated by looking at World War II. Industrial war damage was heaviest in Japan, where 1/4 of factory buildings and 1/3 of plant and equipment were destroyed; 1/7 of electric power-generating capacity was destroyed and 6/7 of oil refining capacity. The Japanese merchant fleet lost 80% of their ships. In Germany in 1944, when air attacks were heaviest, 6.5% of machine tools were damaged or destroyed, but around 90% were later repaired. About 10% of steel production capacity was lost. In Europe, the United States and the Soviet Union enormous resources were accumulated and ultimately dissipated as planes, ships, tanks and so on were built and then lost or destroyed.
Germany’s total war damage was estimated at about 17.5% of the pre-war total capital stock by value, i.e. about 1/6. In the Berlin area alone, there were 8 million refugees lacking basic necessities. In 1945, less than 10% of the railways were still operating. 2,395 rail bridges were destroyed and a total of 7,500 bridges, 10,000 locomotives and more than 100,000 goods wagons were destroyed. Less than 40% of the remaining locomotives were operational.
However, by the first quarter of 1946 European rail traffic, which was given assistance and preferences (by Western appointed military governors) for resources and material as an essential asset, regained its prewar operational level. At the end of the year, 90% of Germany’s railway lines were operating again. In retrospect, the rapidity of infrastructure reconstruction appears astonishing.
Initially, in May 1945 newly installed United States president Harry S. Truman‘s directive had been that no steps would be taken towards economic rehabilitation of Germany. In fact, the initial industry plan of 1946 prohibited production in excess of half of the 1938 level; the iron and steel industry was allowed to produce only less than a third of pre-war output. These plans were rapidly revised and better plans were instituted. In 1946, over 10% of Germany’s physical capital stock (plant and equipment) was also dismantled and confiscated, most of it going to the Soviet Union. By 1947, industrial production in Germany was at 1/3 of the 1938 level and industrial investment at about 1/2 the 1938 level.
The first big strike-wave in the Ruhr occurred in early 1947—it was about food rations and housing, but soon there were demands for nationalisation. However, the United States appointed military governor (Newman) stated at the time that he had the power to break strikes by withholding food rations. The clear message was “no work, no eat”. As the military controls in Western Germany were nearly all relinquished and the Germans were allowed to rebuild their own economy with Marshall Plan aid things rapidly improved. By 1951, German industrial production had overtaken the prewar level. The Marshall Aid funds were important, but after the currency reform (which permitted German capitalists to revalue their assets) and the establishment of a new political system much more important was the commitment of the United States to rebuilding German capitalism and establishing a free market economy and government, rather than keeping Germany in a weak position. Initially, average real wages remained low, lower even than in 1938, until the early 1950s while profitability was unusually high. So the total investment fund, aided by credits, was also high, resulting in a high rate of capital accumulation which was nearly all reinvested in new construction or new tools. This was called the German economic miracle or Wirtschaftswunder.[138]
In Italy, the victorious Allies did three things in 1945: they imposed their absolute military authority; they quickly disarmed the Italian partisans from a very large stock of weapons; and they agreed to a state guarantee of wage payments as well as a veto on all sackings of workers from their jobs.[139] Although the Italian Communist Party grew very large immediately after the war ended—it achieved a membership of 1.7 million people in a population of 45 million—it was outmaneuvered through a complicated political battle by the Christian Democrats after three years.[140] In the 1950s, an economic boom began in Italy, at first fueled by internal demand and then also by exports.[141]
In modern times, it has often been possible to rebuild physical capital assets destroyed in wars completely within the space of about 10 years, except in cases of severe pollution by chemical warfare or other kinds of irreparable devastation. However, damage to human capital has been much more devastating in terms of fatalities (in the case of World War II, about 55 million deaths), permanent physical disability, enduring ethnic hostility and psychological injuries which have effects for at least several generations.
Critics of capitalism associate the economic system with social inequality; unfair distribution of wealth and power; materialism; repression of workers and trade unionists; social alienation; economic inequality; unemployment; and economic instability. Many socialists consider capitalism to be irrational in that production and the direction of the economy are unplanned, creating many inconsistencies and internal contradictions.[142] Capitalism and individual property rights have been associated with the tragedy of the anticommons where owners are unable to agree. Marxian economistRichard D. Wolff postulates that capitalist economies prioritize profits and capital accumulation over the social needs of communities and capitalist enterprises rarely include the workers in the basic decisions of the enterprise.[143]Democratic socialists argue that the role of the state in a capitalist society is to defend the interests of the bourgeoisie.[144] These states take actions to implement such things as unified national markets, national currencies and customs system.[144] Capitalism and capitalist governments have also been criticized as oligarchic in nature[145][146][147] due to the inevitable inequality[148][149] characteristic of economic progress.[150][151]
Some labor historians and scholars have argued that unfree labor—by slaves, indentured servants, prisoners or other coerced persons—is compatible with capitalist relations. Tom Brass argued that unfree labor is acceptable to capital.[152][153] Historian Greg Grandin argues that capitalism has its origins in slavery, saying that “[w]hen historians talk about the Atlantic market revolution, they are talking about capitalism. And when they are talking about capitalism, they are talking about slavery.”[154] Some historians, including Edward E. Baptist and Sven Beckert, assert that slavery was an integral component in the violent development of American and global capitalism.[155][156] The Slovenian continental philosopherSlavoj Žižek posits that the new era of global capitalism has ushered in new forms of contemporary slavery, including migrant workers deprived of basic civil rights on the Arabian Peninsula, the total control of workers in Asian sweatshops, and the use of forced labor in the exploitation of natural resources in Central Africa.[157]
According to Immanuel Wallerstein, institutional racism has been “one of the most significant pillars” of the capitalist system and serves as “the ideological justification for the hierarchization of the work-force and its highly unequal distributions of reward”.[158]
Many aspects of capitalism have come under attack from the anti-globalization movement, which is primarily opposed to corporate capitalism. Environmentalists have argued that capitalism requires continual economic growth and that it will inevitably deplete the finite natural resources of Earth and cause mass extinctions of animal and plant life.[159][160][161] Such critics argue that while neoliberalism, the ideological backbone of contemporary globalized capitalism, has indeed increased global trade, it has also destroyed traditional ways of life, exacerbated inequality and increased global poverty—with more living today in abject poverty than before neoliberalism and that environmental indicators indicate massive environmental degradation since the late 1970s.[22][162][163][164]
Some scholars blame the financial crisis of 2007–2008 on the neoliberal capitalist model.[171] Following the banking crisis of 2007, Alan Greenspan told the United States Congress on 23 October 2008 that “[t]his modern risk-management paradigm held sway for decades. The whole intellectual edifice, however, collapsed in the summer of last year”,[172] and that “I made a mistake in presuming that the self-interests of organizations, specifically banks and others, were such that they were best capable of protecting their own shareholders and their equity in firms […] I was shocked”.[173]
Many religions have criticized or opposed specific elements of capitalism. Traditional Judaism, Christianity, and Islam forbid lending money at interest,[174][175] although alternative methods of banking have been developed. Some Christians have criticized capitalism for its materialist aspects and its inability to account for the wellbeing of all people.[176] Many of Jesus’ parables deal with economic concerns: farming, shepherding, being in debt, doing hard labor, being excluded from banquets and the houses of the rich and have implications for wealth and power distribution.[177][178] Catholic scholars and clergy have often criticized capitalism because of its disenfranchisement of the poor, often promoting distributism as an alternative. In his 84-page apostolic exhortationEvangelii gaudium, Catholic PopeFrancis described unfettered capitalism as “a new tyranny” and called on world leaders to fight rising poverty and inequality:[179]
Some people continue to defend trickle-down theories which assume that economic growth, encouraged by a free market, will inevitably succeed in bringing about greater justice and inclusiveness in the world. This opinion, which has never been confirmed by the facts, expresses a crude and naive trust in the goodness of those wielding economic power and in the sacralized workings of the prevailing economic system. Meanwhile, the excluded are still waiting.[180]
Proponents of capitalism argue that it creates more prosperity than any other economic system and that its benefits are mainly to the ordinary person.[181] Critics of capitalism variously associate it with economic instability,[182] an inability to provide for the well-being of all people[183] and an unsustainable danger to the natural environment.[159]Socialists maintain that although capitalism is superior to all previously existing economic systems (such as feudalism or slavery), the contradiction between class interests will only be resolved by advancing into a completely new social system of production and distribution in which all persons have an equal relationship to the means of production.[184]
The term capitalism in its modern sense is often attributed to Karl Marx.[42][185] In his Das Kapital, Marx analyzed the “capitalist mode of production” using a method of understanding today known as Marxism. However, Marx himself rarely used the term “capitalism” while it was used twice in the more political interpretations of his work, primarily authored by his collaborator Friedrich Engels. In the 20th century, defenders of the capitalist system often replaced the term capitalism with phrases such as free enterprise and private enterprise and replaced capitalist with rentier and investor in reaction to the negative connotations associated with capitalism.[134]
The profit motive
The majority of criticisms against the profit motive centre on the idea that the profit motive encourages selfishness and greed, rather than serve the public good or necessarily creating an increase in net wealth. Critics of the profit motive contend that companies disregard morals or public safety in the pursuit of profits.[186][187][188][189]
Free market economists counter that the profit motive, coupled with competition, actually reduces the final price of an item for consumption, rather than raising it. They argue that businesses profit by selling a good at a lower price and at a greater volume than the competition. Economist Thomas Sowell uses supermarkets as an example to illustrate this point: “It has been estimated that a supermarket makes a clear profit of about a penny on a dollar of sales. If that sounds pretty skimpy, remember that it is collecting that penny on every dollar at several cash registers simultaneously and, in many cases, around the clock”.[190]
American economist Milton Friedman has argued that greed and self-interest are universal human traits. On a 1979 episode of The Phil Donahue Show, Friedman states: “The world runs on individuals pursuing their separate interests”. He continues by explaining that only in capitalist countries, where individuals can pursue their own self-interest, people have been able to escape from “grinding poverty”.[191]
Wage labor has long been compared to slavery.[192][193][194][195] As a result, the phrase “wage slavery” is often utilized as a pejorative for wage labor.[196] Similarly, advocates of slavery looked upon the “comparative evils of Slave Society and of Free Society, of slavery to human Masters and slavery to Capital”[197] and proceeded to argue that wage slavery was actually worse than chattel slavery.[198] Slavery apologists like George Fitzhugh contended that workers only accepted wage labor with the passage of time as they became “familiarised and inattentive to the infected social atmosphere they continually inhale”.[197] Scholars have debated the exact relationship between wage labor, slavery, and capitalism at length, especially for the Antebellum South.[199]
Similarities between wage labor and slavery were noted as early as Cicero in Ancient Rome, such as in De Officiis.[200] With the advent of the Industrial Revolution, thinkers such as Pierre-Joseph Proudhon and Karl Marx elaborated the comparison between wage labor and slavery in the context of a critique of societal property not intended for active personal use[201][202] while Luddites emphasized the dehumanisation brought about by machines. Before the American Civil War, Southern defenders of African American slavery invoked the concept of wage slavery to favorably compare the condition of their slaves to workers in the North.[203][204] The United States abolished slavery during the Civil War, but labor union activists found the metaphor useful. According to Lawrence Glickman, in the Gilded Age “references abounded in the labor press, and it is hard to find a speech by a labour leader without the phrase”.[205]
The slave, together with his labour-power, was sold to his owner once for all. […] The [wage] labourer, on the other hand, sells his very self, and that by fractions. […] He [belongs] to the capitalist class; and it is for him […] to find a buyer in this capitalist class.[206]
According to Noam Chomsky, analysis of the psychological implications of wage slavery goes back to the Enlightenment era. In his 1791 book On the Limits of State Action, liberal thinker Wilhelm von Humboldt explained how “whatever does not spring from a man’s free choice, or is only the result of instruction and guidance, does not enter into his very nature; he does not perform it with truly human energies, but merely with mechanical exactness” and so when the laborer works under external control, “we may admire what he does, but we despise what he is”.[207] Both the Milgram and Stanford experiments have been found useful in the psychological study of wage-based workplace relations.[208] Additionally, as per anthropologist David Graeber, the earliest wage labor contracts we know about were in fact contracts for the rental of chattel slaves (usually the owner would receive a share of the money and the slave another, with which to maintain his or her living expenses). According to Graeber, such arrangements were quite common in New World slavery as well, whether in the United States or Brazil.[209]C. L. R. James argued in The Black Jacobins that most of the techniques of human organisation employed on factory workers during the Industrial Revolution were first developed on slave plantations.[210]
Girl pulling a coal tub in mine, from official report of the British parliamentary commission in the mid 19th century[211]
Some anti-capitalist thinkers claim that the elite maintain wage slavery and a divided working class through their influence over the media and entertainment industry,[212][213] educational institutions, unjust laws, nationalist and corporate propaganda, pressures and incentives to internalize values serviceable to the power structure, state violence, fear of unemployment[214] and a historical legacy of exploitation and profit accumulation/transfer under prior systems, which shaped the development of economic theory:
Adam Smith noted that employers often conspire together to keep wages low:[215]
The interest of the dealers… in any particular branch of trade or manufactures, is always in some respects different from, and even opposite to, that of the public… [They] have generally an interest to deceive and even to oppress the public… We rarely hear, it has been said, of the combinations of masters, though frequently of those of workmen. But whoever imagines, upon this account, that masters rarely combine, is as ignorant of the world as of the subject. Masters are always and everywhere in a sort of tacit, but constant and uniform combination, not to raise the wages of labor above their actual rate… It is not, however, difficult to foresee which of the two parties must, upon all ordinary occasions, have the advantage in the dispute, and force the other into a compliance with their terms.
Aristotle made the statement that “the citizens must not live a mechanic or a mercantile life (for such a life is ignoble and inimical to virtue), nor yet must those who are to be citizens in the best state be tillers of the soil (for leisure is needed both for the development of virtue and for active participation in politics)”,[216] often paraphrased as “all paid jobs absorb and degrade the mind”.[217] Cicero wrote in 44 BC that “vulgar are the means of livelihood of all hired workmen whom we pay for mere manual labour, not for artistic skill; for in their case the very wage they receive is a pledge of their slavery”.[218] Somewhat similar criticisms have also been expressed by some proponents of liberalism, like Henry George,[219][220]Silvio Gesell and Thomas Paine[221] as well as the Distributist school of thought within the Roman Catholic Church.
For Marxists, labor as commodity, which is how they regard wage labor,[222] provides a fundamental point of attack against capitalism.[223] “It can be persuasively argued”, noted one concerned philosopher, “that the conception of the worker’s labour as a commodity confirms Marx’s stigmatization of the wage system of private capitalism as ‘wage-slavery;’ that is, as an instrument of the capitalist’s for reducing the worker’s condition to that of a slave, if not below it”.[224] That this objection is fundamental follows immediately from Marx’s conclusion that wage labor is the very foundation of capitalism: “Without a class dependent on wages, the moment individuals confront each other as free persons, there can be no production of surplus value; without the production of surplus-value there can be no capitalist production, and hence no capital and no capitalist!”.[225]
Marx considered capitalism to be a historically specific mode of production (the way in which the productive property is owned and controlled, combined with the corresponding social relations between individuals based on their connection with the process of production).[41]
The “capitalistic era” according to Karl Marx dates from 16th-century merchants and small urban workshops.[40] Marx knew that wage labour existed on a modest scale for centuries before capitalist industry. For Marx, the capitalist stage of development or “bourgeois society” represented the most advanced form of social organization to date, but he also thought that the working classes would come to power in a worldwide socialist or communist transformation of human society as the end of the series of first aristocratic, then capitalist and finally working class rule was reached.[226][227]
Following Adam Smith, Marx distinguished the use value of commodities from their exchange value in the market. According to Marx, capital is created with the purchase of commodities for the purpose of creating new commodities with an exchange value higher than the sum of the original purchases. For Marx, the use of labor power had itself become a commodity under capitalism and the exchange value of labor power, as reflected in the wage, is less than the value it produces for the capitalist.
This difference in values, he argues, constitutes surplus value, which the capitalists extract and accumulate. In his book Capital, Marx argues that the capitalist mode of production is distinguished by how the owners of capital extract this surplus from workers—all prior class societies had extracted surplus labor, but capitalism was new in doing so via the sale-value of produced commodities.[228] He argues that a core requirement of a capitalist society is that a large portion of the population must not possess sources of self-sustenance that would allow them to be independent and are instead forced to sell their labor for a wage.[229][230][231]
In conjunction with his criticism of capitalism was Marx’s belief that the working class, due to its relationship to the means of production and numerical superiority under capitalism, would be the driving force behind the socialist revolution.[232] This argument is intertwined with Marx’ version of the labor theory of value arguing that labor is the source of all value and thus of profit.
In Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism (1916), Vladimir Lenin further developed Marxist theory and argued that capitalism necessarily led to monopoly capitalism and the export of capital—which he also called “imperialism”—to find new markets and resources, representing the last and highest stage of capitalism.[233] Some 20th century Marxian economists consider capitalism to be a social formation where capitalist class processes dominate, but are not exclusive.[234]
To these thinkers, capitalist class processes are simply those in which surplus labor takes the form of surplus value, usable as capital; other tendencies for utilization of labor nonetheless exist simultaneously in existing societies where capitalist processes predominate. However, other late Marxian thinkers argue that a social formation as a whole may be classed as capitalist if capitalism is the mode by which a surplus is extracted, even if this surplus is not produced by capitalist activity as when an absolute majority of the population is engaged in non-capitalist economic activity.[235]
In Limits to Capital (1982), David Harvey outlines an overdetermined, “spatially restless” capitalism coupled with the spatiality of crisis formation and resolution.[236] Harvey used Marx’s theory of crisis to aid his argument that capitalism must have its “fixes”, but that we cannot predetermine what fixes will be implemented, nor in what form they will be. His work on contractions of capital accumulation and international movements of capitalist modes of production and money flows has been influential.[237] According to Harvey, capitalism creates the conditions for volatile and geographically uneven development [238]
Sociologists such as Ulrich Beck envisioned the society of risk as a new cultural value which saw risk as a commodity to be exchanged in globalized economies. This theory suggested that disasters and capitalist economy were inevitably entwined. Disasters allow the introduction of economic programs which otherwise would be rejected as well as decentralizing the class structure in production.[239]
Criticisms on the environmental sustainability of capitalism
Scholars argue that the capitalist approach to environmental economics does not take into consideration the preserving of natural resources.[240] Capitalism creates three ecological problems: growth, technology, and consumption.[241] The growth problem results from the nature of capitalism, as it focuses around the accumulation of Capital.[241] The innovation of new technologies has an impact on the environmental future as they serve as a capitalist tool in which environmental technologies can result in the expansion of the system.[242] Consumption is focused around the capital accumulation of commodities and neglects the use-value of production.[241]
Supply and demand
At least two assumptions are necessary for the validity of the standard model: first, that supply and demand are independent; and second, that supply is “constrained by a fixed resource”. If these conditions do not hold, then the Marshallian model cannot be sustained. Sraffa’s critique focused on the inconsistency (except in implausible circumstances) of partial equilibrium analysis and the rationale for the upward slope of the supply curve in a market for a produced consumption good.[243] The notability of Sraffa’s critique is also demonstrated by Paul A. Samuelson‘s comments and engagements with it over many years, for example:
What a cleaned-up version of Sraffa (1926) establishes is how nearly empty are all of Marshall’s partial equilibrium boxes. To a logical purist of Wittgenstein and Sraffa class, the Marshallian partial equilibrium box of constant cost is even more empty than the box of increasing cost.[244]
Aggregate excess demand in a market is the difference between the quantity demanded and the quantity supplied as a function of price. In the model with an upward-sloping supply curve and downward-sloping demand curve, the aggregate excess demand function only intersects the axis at one point, namely at the point where the supply and demand curves intersect. The Sonnenschein–Mantel–Debreu theorem shows that the standard model cannot be rigorously derived in general from general equilibrium theory.[245]
The model of prices being determined by supply and demand assumes perfect competition. However, “economists have no adequate model of how individuals and firms adjust prices in a competitive model. If all participants are price-takers by definition, then the actor who adjusts prices to eliminate excess demand is not specified”.[246] Goodwin, Nelson, Ackerman and Weisskopf write:
If we mistakenly confuse precision with accuracy, then we might be misled into thinking that an explanation expressed in precise mathematical or graphical terms is somehow more rigorous or useful than one that takes into account particulars of history, institutions or business strategy. This is not the case. Therefore, it is important not to put too much confidence in the apparent precision of supply and demand graphs. Supply and demand analysis is a useful precisely formulated conceptual tool that clever people have devised to help us gain an abstract understanding of a complex world. It does not—nor should it be expected to—give us in addition an accurate and complete description of any particular real world market.[247]
Market failure occurs when an externality is present and a market will often either under-produce a product with a positive externalisation or overproduce a product that generates a negative externalisation.[citation needed] Air pollution, for instance, is a negative externalisation that cannot be easily incorporated into markets as the world’s air is not owned and then sold for use to polluters.[citation needed] So too much pollution could be emitted and people not involved in the production pay the cost of the pollution instead of the firm that initially emitted the air pollution.[citation needed] Critics of market failure theory, like Ronald Coase, Harold Demsetz and James M. Buchanan, argue that government programs and policies also fall short of absolute perfection.[citation needed] While all nations currently have some kind of market regulations, the desirable degree of regulation is disputed.[citation needed]
Counter-criticisms
Austrian School
Austrian School economists have argued that capitalism can organize itself into a complex system without an external guidance or central planning mechanism. Friedrich Hayek considered the phenomenon of self-organisation as underpinning capitalism. Prices serve as a signal as to the urgent and unfilled wants of people and the opportunity to earn profits if successful, or absorb losses if resources are used poorly or left idle, gives entrepreneurs incentive to use their knowledge and resources to satisfy those wants. Thus the activities of millions of people, each seeking his own interest, are coordinated.[248]
Ayn Rand
The novelist and philosopher Ayn Rand made positive moral defenses of laissez-faire capitalism, most notably in her 1957 novel Atlas Shrugged and in her 1966 collection of essays Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal. She argued that capitalism should be supported on moral grounds, not just on the basis of practical benefits.[249][250] Her ideas have had significant influence over conservative and libertarian supporters of capitalism, especially within the American Tea Party movement.[251] Rand defined capitalism as “a social system based on the recognition of individual rights, including property rights, in which all property is privately owned”.[252] According to Rand, the role of government in a capitalist state has three broad categories of proper functions: first, the police “to protect men from criminals”; second, the armed services “to protect men from foreign invaders”; and third, the law courts “to settle disputes among men according to objective laws”.[253]
Socialist systems are divided into non-market and market forms.[16] Non-market socialism involves the substitution of factor markets and money with engineering and technical criteria based on calculation performed in-kind, thereby producing an economic mechanism that functions according to different economic laws from those of capitalism. Non-market socialism aims to circumvent the inefficiencies and crises traditionally associated with capital accumulation and the profit system.[25] By contrast, market socialism retains the use of monetary prices, factor markets and in some cases the profit motive, with respect to the operation of socially owned enterprises and the allocation of capital goods between them. Profits generated by these firms would be controlled directly by the workforce of each firm, or accrue to society at large in the form of a social dividend.[26][27][28] The socialist calculation debate concerns the feasibility and methods of resource allocation for a socialist system.
Socialist politics has been both internationalist and nationalist in orientation; organised through political parties and opposed to party politics; at times overlapping with trade unions, and at other times independent and critical of unions; and present in both industrialised and developing nations.[29] Originating within the socialist movement, social democracy has embraced a mixed economy with a market that includes substantial state intervention in the form of income redistribution, regulation, and a welfare state. Economic democracy proposes a sort of market socialism where there is more decentralised control of companies, currencies, investments, and natural resources.
The socialist political movement includes a set of political philosophies that originated in the revolutionary movements of the mid-to-late 18th century and out of concern for the social problems that were associated with capitalism.[13] By the late 19th century, after the work of Karl Marx and his collaborator Friedrich Engels, socialism had come to signify opposition to capitalism and advocacy for a post-capitalist system based on some form of social ownership of the means of production.[30][31] By the 1920s, social democracy and communism had become the two dominant political tendencies within the international socialist movement.[32] By this time, socialism emerged as “the most influential secular movement of the twentieth century, worldwide. It is a political ideology (or world view), a wide and divided political movement”[33] and while the emergence of the Soviet Union as the world’s first nominally socialist state led to socialism’s widespread association with the Soviet economic model, some economists and intellectuals argued that in practice the model functioned as a form of state capitalism[34][35][36] or a non-planned administrative or command economy.[37][38]Socialist parties and ideas remain a political force with varying degrees of power and influence on all continents, heading national governments in many countries around the world. Today, some socialists have also adopted the causes of other social movements, such as environmentalism, feminism and progressivism.[39] In 21st century America, the term socialism, without clear definition, has become a pejorative used by conservatives to taint liberal and progressive policies, proposals, and public figures.[40]
For Andrew Vincent, “[t]he word ‘socialism’ finds its root in the Latin sociare, which means to combine or to share. The related, more technical term in Roman and then medieval law was societas. This latter word could mean companionship and fellowship as well as the more legalistic idea of a consensual contract between freemen”.[41]
The term “socialism” was created by Henri de Saint-Simon, one of the founders of what would later be labelled “utopian socialism“. Simon coined the term as a contrast to the liberal doctrine of “individualism“, which stressed that people act or should act as if they are in isolation from one another.[42] The original “utopian” socialists condemned liberal individualism for failing to address social concerns during the industrial revolution, including poverty, social oppression and gross inequalities in wealth, thus viewing liberal individualism as degenerating society into supporting selfish egoism that harmed community life through promoting a society based on competition.[42] They presented socialism as an alternative to liberal individualism based on the shared ownership of resources, although their proposals for socialism differed significantly. Saint-Simon proposed economic planning, scientific administration and the application of modern scientific advancements to the organisation of society. By contrast, Robert Owen proposed the organisation of production and ownership in cooperatives.[42][43]
The modern definition and usage of “socialism” settled by the 1860s, becoming the predominant term among the group of words “co-operative”, “mutualist” and “associationist”, which had previously been used as synonyms. The term “communism” also fell out of use during this period, despite earlier distinctions between socialism and communism from the 1840s.[47] An early distinction between socialism and communism was that the former aimed to only socialise production while the latter aimed to socialise both production and consumption (in the form of free access to final goods).[48] However, Marxists employed the term “socialism” in place of “communism” by 1888, which had come to be considered an old-fashion synonym for socialism. It was not until 1917 after the Bolshevik Revolution that “socialism” came to refer to a distinct stage between capitalism and communism, introduced by Vladimir Lenin as a means to defend the Bolshevik seizure of power against traditional Marxist criticisms that Russia’s productive forces were not sufficiently developed for socialist revolution.[49]
A distinction between “communist” and “socialist” as descriptors of political ideologies arose in 1918 after the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party renamed itself to the All-Russian Communist Party, where communist came to specifically mean socialists who supported the politics and theories of Leninism, Bolshevism and later Marxism–Leninism,[50] although communist parties continued to describe themselves as socialists dedicated to socialism.[51]
The words “socialism” and “communism” eventually accorded with the adherents’ and opponents’ cultural attitude towards religion. In Christian Europe, communism was believed to be the atheist way of life. In Protestant England, the word “communism” was too culturally and aurally close to the Roman Catholic communion rite, hence English atheists denoted themselves socialists.[52]Friedrich Engels argued that in 1848, at the time when The Communist Manifesto was published, that “socialism was respectable on the continent, while communism was not”. The Owenites in England and the Fourierists in France were considered “respectable” socialists, while working-class movements that “proclaimed the necessity of total social change” denoted themselves communists. This latter branch of socialism produced the communist work of Étienne Cabet in France and Wilhelm Weitling in Germany.[53] The British moral philosopherJohn Stuart Mill also came to advocate a form of economic socialism within a liberal context. In later editions of his Principles of Political Economy (1848), Mill would argue that “as far as economic theory was concerned, there is nothing in principle in economic theory that precludes an economic order based on socialist policies”.[54][55] While democrats looked to the Revolutions of 1848 as a democratic revolution, which in the long run ensured liberty, equality and fraternity, Marxists denounced 1848 as a betrayal of working-class ideals by a bourgeoisie indifferent to the legitimate demands of the proletariat.[56]
Socialist models and ideas espousing common or public ownership have existed since antiquity. The economy of the 3rd century BCE Mauryan Empire of India has been described as “a socialized monarchy” and “a sort of state socialism”.[57][58] It has been claimed—though controversially—that there were elements of socialist thought in the politics of classical Greek philosophers Plato[59] and Aristotle.[60]Mazdak the Younger (died c. 524 or 528 CE), a Persian communal proto-socialist,[61] instituted communal possessions and advocated the public good. Abū Dharr al-Ghifārī, a Companion of Prophet Muhammad, is credited by many as a principal antecedent of Islamic socialism.[62][63][64][65][66] The teachings of Jesus the messiah of the Christian religion are frequently highlighted as socialist in nature, though this is disputed.[67] Acts 4:35 records that the early church in Jerusalem ‘No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own’; however the pattern soon disappears from church history except within monasticism. Christian socialism was one of the founding threads of the UK Labour Party and is said to be a tradition going back 600 years to the uprising of Wat Tyler and John Ball.[68] In the period right after the French Revolution, activists and theorists like François-Noël Babeuf, Étienne-Gabriel Morelly, Philippe Buonarroti and Auguste Blanqui influenced the early French labour and socialist movements.[69] In Britain, Thomas Paine proposed a detailed plan to tax property owners to pay for the needs of the poor in Agrarian Justice[70] while Charles Hall wrote The Effects of Civilization on the People in European States, denouncing capitalism’s effects on the poor of his time[71] which influenced the utopian schemes of Thomas Spence.[72]
The first self-conscious socialist movements developed in the 1820s and 1830s. The Owenites, Saint-Simonians and Fourierists provided a series of coherent analyses and interpretations of society. They also, especially in the case of the Owenites, overlapped with a number of other working-class movements like the Chartists in the United Kingdom”.[73] The Chartists gathered significant numbers around the People’s Charter of 1838, which sought a number of democratic reforms focused on the extension of suffrage to all male adults. Leaders in the movement also called for a more equitable distribution of income and better living conditions for the working classes. The very first trade unions and consumers’ cooperative societies also emerged in the hinterland of the Chartist movement as a way of bolstering the fight for these demands.[74] A later important socialist thinker in France was Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, who proposed his philosophy of mutualism in which “everyone had an equal claim, either alone or as part of a small cooperative, to possess and use land and other resources as needed to make a living”.[75] There were also currents inspired by dissident Christianity of Christian socialism “often in Britain and then usually coming out of left liberal politics and a romantic anti-industrialism”[69] which produced theorists such as Edward Bellamy, Frederick Denison Maurice and Charles Kingsley.[76]
The first advocates of socialism favoured social levelling in order to create a meritocratic or technocratic society based on individual talent. Count Henri de Saint-Simon is regarded as the first individual to coin the term “socialism”.[77] Saint-Simon was fascinated by the enormous potential of science and technology and advocated a socialist society that would eliminate the disorderly aspects of capitalism and would be based on equal opportunities.[78][unreliable source?] He advocated the creation of a society in which each person was ranked according to his or her capacities and rewarded according to his or her work.[77] The key focus of Saint-Simon’s socialism was on administrative efficiency and industrialism and a belief that science was the key to progress.[79] This was accompanied by a desire to implement a rationally organised economy based on planning and geared towards large-scale scientific and material progress,[77] thus embodied a desire for a more directed or planned economy. Other early socialist thinkers, such as Thomas Hodgkin and Charles Hall, based their ideas on David Ricardo‘s economic theories. They reasoned that the equilibrium value of commodities approximated prices charged by the producer when those commodities were in elastic supply and that these producer prices corresponded to the embodied labour—the cost of the labour (essentially the wages paid) that was required to produce the commodities. The Ricardian socialists viewed profit, interest and rent as deductions from this exchange-value.[citation needed]
West European social critics, including Robert Owen, Charles Fourier, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, Louis Blanc, Charles Hall, and Saint-Simon were the first modern socialists who criticised the excessive poverty and inequality of the Industrial Revolution. They advocated reform, with some such as Robert Owen advocating the transformation of society to small communities without private property. Robert Owen’s contribution to modern socialism was his understanding that actions and characteristics of individuals were largely determined by the social environment they were raised in and exposed to.[79] On the other hand, Charles Fourier advocated phalansteres which were communities that respected individual desires (including sexual preferences), affinities and creativity and saw that work has to be made enjoyable for people.[80] The ideas of Owen and Fourier were tried in practice in numerous intentional communities around Europe and the American continent in the mid-19th century.
Paris Commune
The celebration of the election of the Commune on 28 March 1871—the Paris Commune was a major early implementation of socialist ideas
The Paris Commune was a government that briefly ruled Paris from 18 March (more formally, from 28 March) to 28 May 1871. The Commune was the result of an uprising in Paris after France was defeated in the Franco-Prussian War. The Commune elections held on 26 March elected a Commune council of 92 members, one member for each 20,000 residents.[81] Despite internal differences, the council began to organise the public services essential for a city of two million residents. It also reached a consensus on certain policies that tended towards a progressive, secular and highly democratic social democracy.
Because the Commune was only able to meet on fewer than 60 days in all, only a few decrees were actually implemented. These included the separation of church and state; the remission of rents owed for the entire period of the siege (during which payment had been suspended); the abolition of night work in the hundreds of Paris bakeries; the granting of pensions to the unmarried companions and children of National Guards killed on active service; and the free return, by the city pawnshops, of all workmen’s tools and household items valued up to 20 francs, pledged during the siege.[82] The Commune was concerned that skilled workers had been forced to pawn their tools during the war; the postponement of commercial debt obligations and the abolition of interest on the debts; and the right of employees to take over and run an enterprise if it were deserted by its owner. The Commune nonetheless recognised the previous owner’s right to compensation.[82]
The International Workingmen’s Association (IWA), often called the First International, was founded in London in 1864. The International Workingmen’s Association united diverse revolutionary currents including French followers of Proudhon,[83]Blanquists, Philadelphes, English trade unionists, socialists and social democrats. The IWA held a preliminary conference in 1865 and had its first congress at Geneva in 1866. Due to the wide variety of philosophies present in the First International, there was conflict from the start. The first objections to Marx came from the mutualists who opposed communism and statism. However, shortly after Mikhail Bakunin and his followers (called collectivists while in the International) joined in 1868, the First International became polarised into two camps headed by Marx and Bakunin respectively.[84] The clearest differences between the groups emerged over their proposed strategies for achieving their visions of socialism. The First International became the first major international forum for the promulgation of socialist ideas.
The followers of Bakunin were called collectivist anarchists and sought to collectivise ownership of the means of production while retaining payment proportional to the amount and kind of labour of each individual. Like Proudhonists, they asserted the right of each individual to the product of his labour and to be remunerated for their particular contribution to production. By contrast, anarcho-communists sought collective ownership of both the means and the products of labour. Errico Malatesta put it: “[I]nstead of running the risk of making a confusion in trying to distinguish what you and I each do, let us all work and put everything in common. In this way each will give to society all that his strength permits until enough is produced for every one; and each will take all that he needs, limiting his needs only in those things of which there is not yet plenty for every one”.[85]Anarcho-communism as a coherent, modern economic-political philosophy was first formulated in the Italian section of the First International by Carlo Cafiero, Emilio Covelli, Errico Malatesta, Andrea Costa and other ex Mazzinian republicans.[86] Out of respect for Mikhail Bakunin, they did not make their differences with collectivist anarchism explicit until after Bakunin’s death.[87]
Syndicalism emerged in France inspired in part by the ideas of Pierre-Joseph Proudhon and later by Fernand Pelloutier and Georges Sorel.[88] It developed at the end of the 19th century out of the French trade-union movement (syndicat is the French word for trade union). It was a significant force in Italy and Spain in the early 20th century until it was crushed by the fascist regimes in those countries. In the United States, syndicalism appeared in the guise of the Industrial Workers of the World, or “Wobblies”, founded in 1905.[88] Syndicalism is an economic system where industries are organised into confederations (syndicates)[89] and the economy is managed by negotiation between specialists and worker representatives of each field, comprising multiple non-competitive categorised units.[90] Syndicalism is thus a form of communism and economic corporatism, but also refers to the political movement and tactics used to bring about this type of system. An influential anarchist movement based on syndicalist ideas is anarcho-syndicalism.[91] The International Workers Association is an international anarcho-syndicalist federation of various labour unions from different countries.
Guild socialism is a political movement advocating workers’ control of industry through the medium of trade-related guilds “in an implied contractual relationship with the public”.[94] It originated in the United Kingdom and was at its most influential in the first quarter of the 20th century. Inspired by medieval guilds, theorists such as Samuel G. Hobson and G. D. H. Cole advocated the public ownership of industries and their organisation into guilds, each of which would be under the democratic control of its trade union. Guild socialists were less inclined than Fabians to invest power in a state.[88] At some point, like the American Knights of Labor, guild socialism wanted to abolish the wage system.[citation needed]
Second International
As the ideas of Marx and Engels took on flesh, particularly in central Europe, socialists sought to unite in an international organisation. In 1889 (the centennial of the French Revolution of 1789), the Second International was founded, with 384 delegates from twenty countries representing about 300 labour and socialist organisations.[95] It was termed the Socialist International and Engels was elected honorary president at the third congress in 1893. Anarchists were ejected and not allowed in, mainly due to pressure from Marxists.[96] It has been argued that at some point the Second International turned “into a battleground over the issue of libertarian versus authoritarian socialism. Not only did they effectively present themselves as champions of minority rights; they also provoked the German Marxists into demonstrating a dictatorial intolerance which was a factor in preventing the British labour movement from following the Marxist direction indicated by such leaders as H. M. Hyndman“.[96]
Reformism arose as an alternative to revolution. Eduard Bernstein was a leading social democrat in Germany who proposed the concept of evolutionary socialism. Revolutionary socialists quickly targeted reformism: Rosa Luxemburg condemned Bernstein’s Evolutionary Socialism in her 1900 essay Social Reform or Revolution?. Revolutionary socialism encompasses multiple social and political movements that may define “revolution” differently from one another. The Social Democratic Party (SPD) in Germany became the largest and most powerful socialist party in Europe, despite working illegally until the anti-socialist laws were dropped in 1890. In the 1893 elections, it gained 1,787,000 votes, a quarter of the total votes cast, according to Engels. In 1895, the year of his death, Engels emphasised the Communist Manifesto‘s emphasis on winning, as a first step, the “battle of democracy”.[97]
In Argentina the Socialist Party of Argentina was established in the 1890s led by, among others, Juan B. Justo and Nicolás Repetto, thus becoming the first mass party in the country and in Latin America. The party affiliated itself with the Second International.[98] Between 1924 and 1940 it was a member of the Labour and Socialist International.[99] In 1904, Australians elected Chris Watson as the first Australian Labor Party Prime Minister, becoming the first democratically elected social democrat. In 1909, the first Kibbutz was established in Palestine[100] by Russian Jewish Immigrants. The Kibbutz Movement would then expand through the 20th century following a doctrine of Zionist socialism.[101] The British Labour Party first won seats in the House of Commons in 1902. The International Socialist Commission (ISC, also known as Berne International) was formed in February 1919 at a meeting in Bern by parties that wanted to resurrect the Second International.[102]
Lenin had published essays on his analysis of imperialism, the monopoly and globalisation phase of capitalism as predicted by Marx, as well as analyses on the social conditions of his contemporary time. He observed that as capitalism had further developed in Europe and America, the workers remained unable to gain class consciousness so long as they were too busy working and concerned with how to make ends meet. He therefore proposed that the social revolution would require the leadership of a vanguard party of class-conscious revolutionaries from the educated and politically active part of the population.[103]
Upon arriving in Petrograd, Lenin declared that the revolution in Russia was not over but had only begun, and that the next step was for the workers’ soviets to take full state authority. He issued a thesis outlining the Bolshevik’s party programme, including rejection of any legitimacy in the provisional government and advocacy for state power to be given to the peasant and working class through the soviets. The Bolsheviks became the most influential force in the soviets and on 7 November the capitol of the provisional government was stormed by Bolshevik Red Guards in what afterwards known as the “Great October Socialist Revolution“. The rule of the provisional government was ended and the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic—the world’s first constitutionally socialist state—was established. On 25 January 1918 at the Petrograd Soviet, Lenin declared “Long live the world socialist revolution!”[104] and proposed an immediate armistice on all fronts and transferred the land of the landed proprietors, the crown and the monasteries to the peasant committees without compensation.[105]
The day after assuming executive power on 25 January, Lenin wrote Draft Regulations on Workers’ Control, which granted workers control of businesses with more than five workers and office employees and access to all books, documents and stocks and whose decisions were to be “binding upon the owners of the enterprises”.[106] Governing through the elected soviets and in alliance with the peasant-based Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, the Bolshevik government began nationalising banks and industry; and disavowed the national debts of the deposed Romanov royal régime. It sued for peace, withdrawing from World War I and convoked a Constituent Assembly in which the peasant Socialist-Revolutionary Party (SR) won a majority.[107]
The Constituent Assembly elected Socialist-Revolutionary leader Victor Chernov President of a Russian republic, but rejected the Bolshevik proposal that it endorse the Soviet decrees on land, peace and workers’ control and acknowledge the power of the Soviets of Workers’, Soldiers’ and Peasants’ Deputies. The next day, the Bolsheviks declared that the assembly was elected on outdated party lists[108] and the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of the Soviets dissolved it.[109][110] In March 1919, world communist parties formed Comintern (also known as the Third International) at a meeting in Moscow.[111]
The Bolshevik Russian Revolution of January 1918 engendered communist parties worldwide and their concomitant revolutions of 1917–1923. Few communists doubted that the Russian success of socialism depended on successful, working-class socialist revolutions in developed capitalist countries.[122][123] In 1919, Lenin and Trotsky organised the world’s communist parties into a new international association of workers—the Communist International (Comintern), also called the Third International.
By 1920, the Red Army under its commander Trotsky had largely defeated the royalist White Armies. In 1921, War Communism was ended and under the New Economic Policy (NEP) private ownership was allowed for small and medium peasant enterprises. While industry remained largely state-controlled, Lenin acknowledged that the NEP was a necessary capitalist measure for a country unripe for socialism. Profiteering returned in the form of “NEP men” and rich peasants (kulaks) gained power in the countryside.[131] Nevertheless, the role of Trotsky in this episode has been questioned by other socialists, including ex Trotskyists. In the United States, Dwight Macdonald broke with Trotsky and left the Trotskyist Socialist Workers Party by raising the question of the Kronstadt rebellion, which Trotsky as leader of the Soviet Red Army and the other Bolsheviks had brutally repressed. He then moved towards democratic socialism.[132] and anarchism.[133]
A similar critique of Trotsky’s role on the events around the Kronstadt rebellion was raised by the American anarchist Emma Goldman. In her essay “Trotsky Protests Too Much”, she says: “I admit, the dictatorship under Stalin’s rule has become monstrous. That does not, however, lessen the guilt of Leon Trotsky as one of the actors in the revolutionary drama of which Kronstadt was one of the bloodiest scenes”.[134]
In 1922, the fourth congress of the Communist International took up the policy of the United Front, urging communists to work with rank and file Social Democrats while remaining critical of their leaders, whom they criticised for betraying the working class by supporting the war efforts of their respective capitalist classes. For their part, the social democrats pointed to the dislocation caused by revolution and later the growing authoritarianism of the communist parties. When the Communist Party of Great Britain applied to affiliate to the Labour Party in 1920, it was turned down.
On seeing the Soviet State’s growing coercive power in 1923, a dying Lenin said Russia had reverted to “a bourgeois tsarist machine… barely varnished with socialism”.[135] After Lenin’s death in January 1924, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union—then increasingly under the control of Joseph Stalin—rejected the theory that socialism could not be built solely in the Soviet Union in favour of the concept of “Socialism in One Country“. Despite the marginalised Left Opposition‘s demand for the restoration of Soviet democracy, Stalin developed a bureaucratic, authoritarian government that was condemned by democratic socialists, anarchists and Trotskyists for undermining the initial socialist ideals of the Bolshevik Russian Revolution.[136][137][self-published source?][unreliable source?]
In Spain in 1936, the national anarcho-syndicalist trade union Confederación Nacional del Trabajo (CNT) initially refused to join a popular front electoral alliance and abstention by CNT supporters led to a right-wing election victory. In 1936, the CNT changed its policy and anarchist votes helped bring the popular front back to power. Months later, the former ruling class responded with an attempted coup, sparking the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939).[138]
Much of Spain’s economy was put under worker control and in anarchist strongholds like Catalonia the figure was as high as 75%, but lower in areas with heavy Communist Party of Spain influence, as the Soviet-allied party actively resisted attempts at collectivisation enactment. Factories were run through worker committees, agrarian areas became collectivised and run as libertariancommunes. Anarchist historian Sam Dolgoff estimated that about eight million people participated directly or indirectly in the Spanish Revolution.[140]
Leon Trotsky‘s Fourth International was established in France in 1938 when Trotskyists argued that the Comintern or Third International had become irretrievably “lost to Stalinism” and thus incapable of leading the international working class to political power.[141] The rise of Nazism and the start of World War II led to the dissolution of the LSI in 1940. After the War, the Socialist International was formed in Frankfurt in July 1951 as a successor to the LSI.[142]
After World War II, social democratic governments introduced social reform and wealth redistribution via state welfare and taxation. Social democratic parties dominated post-war politics in countries such as France, Italy, Czechoslovakia, Belgium and Norway. At one point, France claimed to be the world’s most state-controlled capitalist country. The nationalised public utilities included Charbonnages de France (CDF), Electricité de France (EDF), Gaz de France (GDF), Air France, Banque de France and Régie Nationale des Usines Renault.[143]
In 1945, the British Labour Party led by Clement Attlee was elected to office based on a radical socialist programme. The Labour government nationalised major public utilities such as mines, gas, coal, electricity, rail, iron, steel and the Bank of England. British Petroleum was officially nationalised in 1951.[144]Anthony Crosland said that in 1956 25% of British industry was nationalised and that public employees, including those in nationalised industries, constituted a similar proportion of the country’s total employed population.[145] The Labour Governments of 1964–1970 and 1974–1979 intervened further.[146] It re-nationalised steel (1967, British Steel) after the Conservatives had denationalised it and nationalised car production (1976, British Leyland).[147] The National Health Service provided taxpayer-funded health care to everyone, free at the point of service.[148] Working-class housing was provided in council housing estates and university education became available via a school grant system.[149]
The Nordic model is a term for a form of social democracy common to the Nordic countries (Denmark, Iceland, Norway, Sweden and Finland).[150][151][152] During most of the post-war era, Sweden was governed by the Swedish Social Democratic Party largely in cooperation with trade unions and industry.[153] In Sweden, the Social Democratic Party held power from 1936 to 1976, 1982 to 1991, 1994 to 2006 and 2014 to present. Tage Erlander was the leader of the Swedish Social Democratic Party and led the government from 1946 to 1969, an uninterrupted tenure of twenty-three years, one of the longest in any democracy. From 1945 to 1962, the Norwegian Labour Party held an absolute majority in the parliament led by Einar Gerhardsen who was Prime Minister with seventeen years in office. This particular adaptation of the mixed market economy is characterised by more generous welfare states (relative to other developed countries), which are aimed specifically at enhancing individual autonomy, ensuring the universal provision of basic human rights and stabilising the economy. It is distinguished from other welfare states with similar goals by its emphasis on maximising labour force participation, promoting gender equality, egalitarian and extensive benefit levels, large magnitude of redistribution and expansionary fiscal policy.[154]
The Soviet Union played a decisive role in the Allied victory in World War II.[155][156] After the war, the Soviet Union became a recognised superpower.[157] The Soviet era saw some of the most significant technological achievements of the 20th century, including the world’s first spacecraft and the first astronaut. The Soviet economy was the modern world’s first centrally planned economy. It was based on a system of state ownership of industry managed through Gosplan (the State Planning Commission), Gosbank (the State Bank) and the Gossnab (State Commission for Materials and Equipment Supply).
Economic planning was conducted through a series of Five-Year Plans. The emphasis was on fast development of heavy industry and the nation became one of the world’s top manufacturers of a large number of basic and heavy industrial products, but it lagged in light industrial production and consumer durables.[citation needed] Modernisation brought about a general increase in the standard of living.[158]
In the post-war years, socialism became increasingly influential throughout the so-called Third World. Embracing a new Third World socialism, countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America often nationalised industries held by foreign owners. The Chinese Kuomintang Party, the previous ruling party in Taiwan, was referred to as having a socialist ideology since Kuomintang’s revolutionary ideology in the 1920s incorporated unique Chinese socialism as part of its ideology.[167][168] The Soviet Union trained Kuomintang revolutionaries in the Moscow Sun Yat-sen University. Movie theatres in the Soviet Union showed newsreels and clips of Chiang at Moscow Sun Yat-sen University portraits of Chiang were hung on the walls and in the Soviet May Day parades that year Chiang’s portrait was to be carried along with the portraits of Marx, Lenin, Stalin and other socialist leaders.[169]
The Chinese Revolution was the second stage in the Chinese Civil War which ended in the establishment of the People’s Republic of China led by the Chinese Communist Party. The term “Third World” was coined by French demographer Alfred Sauvy in 1952 on the model of the Third Estate, which according to the Abbé Sieyès represented everything, but was nothing “because at the end this ignored, exploited, scorned Third World like the Third Estate, wants to become something too”.
The Cuban Revolution (1953–1959) was an armed revolt conducted by Fidel Castro‘s 26th of July Movement and its allies against the government of Cuban PresidentFulgencio Batista. The revolution began in July 1953 and finally ousted Batista on 1 January 1959, replacing his government with Castro’s revolutionary state. Castro’s government later reformed along communist lines, becoming the Communist Party of Cuba in October 1965.[171]
The New Left was a term used mainly in the United Kingdom and United States in reference to activists, educators, agitators and others in the 1960s and 1970s who sought to implement a broad range of reforms on issues such as gay rights, abortion, gender roles and drugs[177] in contrast to earlier leftist or Marxist movements that had taken a more vanguardist approach to social justice and focused mostly on labour unionisation and questions of social class.[178][179][180] The New Left rejected involvement with the labour movement and Marxism‘s historical theory of class struggle.[181]
In the United States, the New Left was associated with the Hippie movement and anti-war college campus protest movements as well as the black liberation movements such as the Black Panther Party.[182] While initially formed in opposition to the “Old Left” Democratic Party, groups composing the New Left gradually became central players in the Democratic coalition.[177]
The protests of 1968 represented a worldwide escalation of social conflicts, predominantly characterised by popular rebellions against military, capitalist and bureaucratic elites who responded with an escalation of political repression. These protests marked a turning point for the civil rights movement in the United States, which produced revolutionary movements like the Black Panther Party; the prominent civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. organised the “Poor People’s Campaign” to address issues of economic justice,[183] while personally showing sympathy with democratic socialism.[184] In reaction to the Tet Offensive, protests also sparked a broad movement in opposition to the Vietnam War all over the United States and even into London, Paris, Berlin and Rome. In 1968 in Carrara, Italy, the International of Anarchist Federations was founded during an international anarchist conference held there by the three existing European federations of France, the Italian and the Iberian Anarchist Federation as well as the Bulgarian federation in French exile.
Mass socialist or communist movements grew not only in the United States, but also in most European countries. The most spectacular manifestation of this were the May 1968 protests in France in which students linked up with strikes of up to ten million workers and for a few days the movement seemed capable of overthrowing the government.[citation needed]
In many other capitalist countries, struggles against dictatorships, state repression and colonisation were also marked by protests in 1968, such as the beginning of the Troubles in Northern Ireland, the Tlatelolco massacre in Mexico City and the escalation of guerrilla warfare against the military dictatorship in Brazil. Countries governed by communist parties had protests against bureaucratic and military elites. In Eastern Europe there were widespread protests that escalated particularly in the Prague Spring in Czechoslovakia. In response, Soviet Union occupied Czechoslovakia, but the occupation was denounced by the Italian and French[185] communist parties and the Communist Party of Finland. Few western European political leaders defended the occupation, among them the Portuguese communist secretary-general Álvaro Cunhal.[186] along with the Luxembourg party[185] and conservative factions of the Communist Party of Greece.[185]
In the Chinese Cultural Revolution, a social-political youth movement mobilised against “bourgeois” elements which were seen to be infiltrating the government and society at large, aiming to restore capitalism. This movement motivated Maoism-inspired movements around the world in the context of the Sino-Soviet split.[citation needed]
In Latin America in the 1960s, a socialist tendency within the catholic church appeared which was called liberation theology[188][189] which motivated even the Colombian priest Camilo Torres to enter the ELN guerrilla. In Chile, Salvador Allende, a physician and candidate for the Socialist Party of Chile, was elected president through democratic elections in 1970. In 1973, his government was ousted by the United States-backed military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet, which lasted until the late 1980s.[190] Pinochet’s regime was a leader of Operation Condor, a U.S.-backed campaign of repression and state terrorism carried out by the intelligence services of the Southern Cone countries of Latin America to eliminate suspected Communist subversion.[191][192][193] In Jamaica, the democratic socialist[194]Michael Manley served as the fourth Prime Minister of Jamaica from 1972 to 1980 and from 1989 to 1992. According to opinion polls, he remains one of Jamaica’s most popular Prime Ministers since independence.[195] The Nicaraguan Revolution encompassed the rising opposition to the Somoza dictatorship in the 1960s and 1970s, the campaign led by the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) to violently oust the dictatorship in 1978–1979, the subsequent efforts of the FSLN to govern Nicaragua from 1979 until 1990[196] and the socialist measures which included wide-scale agrarian reform[197][198] and educational programs.[199] The People’s Revolutionary Government was proclaimed on 13 March 1979 in Grenada which was overthrown by armed forces of the United States in 1983. The Salvadoran Civil War (1979–1992) was a conflict between the military-led government of El Salvador and the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN), a coalition or umbrella organisation of five socialist guerrilla groups. A coup on 15 October 1979 led to the killings of anti-coup protesters by the government as well as anti-disorder protesters by the guerrillas, and is widely seen as the tipping point towards the civil war.[200]
In Italy, Autonomia Operaia was a leftist movement particularly active from 1976 to 1978. It took an important role in the autonomist movement in the 1970s, aside earlier organisations such as Potere Operaio (created after May 1968) and Lotta Continua.[201] This experience prompted the contemporary socialist radical movement autonomism.[202] In 1982, the newly elected French socialist government of François Mitterrand made nationalisations in a few key industries, including banks and insurance companies.[203]Eurocommunism was a trend in the 1970s and 1980s in various Western European communist parties to develop a theory and practice of social transformation that was more relevant for a Western European country and less aligned to the influence or control of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Outside Western Europe, it is sometimes called neocommunism.[204] Some communist parties with strong popular support, notably the Italian Communist Party (PCI) and the Communist Party of Spain (PCE) adopted Eurocommunism most enthusiastically and the Communist Party of Finland was dominated by Eurocommunists. The French Communist Party (PCF) and many smaller parties strongly opposed Eurocommunism and stayed aligned with the Communist Party of the Soviet Union until the end of the Soviet Union.
In the late 1970s and in the 1980s, the Socialist International (SI) had extensive contacts and discussion with the two powers of the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union, about East-West relations and arms control. Since then, the SI has admitted as member parties the Nicaraguan FSLN, the left-wing Puerto Rican Independence Party, as well as former communist parties such as the Democratic Party of the Left of Italy and the Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (FRELIMO). The SI aided social democratic parties in re-establishing themselves when dictatorship gave way to democracy in Portugal (1974) and Spain (1975). Until its 1976 Geneva Congress, the SI had few members outside Europe and no formal involvement with Latin America.[205]
After Mao’s death in 1976 and the arrest of the faction known as the Gang of Four, who were blamed for the excesses of the Cultural Revolution, Deng Xiaoping took power and led the People’s Republic of China to significant economic reforms. The Communist Party of China loosened governmental control over citizens’ personal lives and the communes were disbanded in favour of private land leases, thus China’s transition from a planned economy to a mixed economy named as “socialism with Chinese characteristics“[206] which maintained state ownership rights over land, state or cooperative ownership of much of the heavy industrial and manufacturing sectors and state influence in the banking and financial sectors. China adopted its current constitution on 4 December 1982. PresidentJiang Zemin and PremierZhu Rongji led the nation in the 1990s. Under their administration, China’s economic performance pulled an estimated 150 million peasants out of poverty and sustained an average annual gross domestic product growth rate of 11.2%.[207][208] At the Sixth National Congress of the Communist Party of Vietnam in December 1986, reformist politicians replaced the “old guard” government with new leadership.[209][210] The reformers were led by 71-year-old Nguyen Van Linh, who became the party’s new general secretary.[209][210] Linh and the reformers implemented a series of free market reforms—known as Đổi Mới (“Renovation”)—which carefully managed the transition from a planned economy to a “socialist-oriented market economy“.[211][212]Mikhail Gorbachev wished to move the Soviet Union towards of Nordic-style social democracy, calling it “a socialist beacon for all mankind”.[213][214] Prior to its dissolution in 1991, the Soviet Union had the second largest economy in the world after the United States.[215] With the collapse of the Soviet Union, the economic integration of the Soviet republics was dissolved and overall industrial activity declined substantially.[216] A lasting legacy remains in the physical infrastructure created during decades of combined industrial production practices, and widespread environmental destruction.[217] The transition to capitalism in the former Soviet Union and Eastern bloc, which was accompanied by Washington Consensus-inspired “shock therapy“,[218] resulted in a steep fall in the standard of living. The region experienced rising economic inequality and poverty[219] a surge in excess mortality[220][221] and a decline in life expectancy,[222] which was accompanied by the entrenchment of a newly established business oligarchy in the former.[219] The average post-communist country had returned to 1989 levels of per-capita GDP by 2005,[223] although some are still far behind that.[224] These developments led to increased nationalist sentiment and nostalgia for the Communist era.[225][226][227]
Many social democratic parties, particularly after the Cold War, adopted neoliberal market policies including privatisation, deregulation and financialisation. They abandoned their pursuit of moderate socialism in favour of market liberalism. By the 1980s, with the rise of conservative neoliberal politicians such as Ronald Reagan in the United States, Margaret Thatcher in Britain, Brian Mulroney in Canada and Augusto Pinochet in Chile, the Western welfare state was attacked from within, but state support for the corporate sector was maintained.[228]Monetarists and neoliberals attacked social welfare systems as impediments to private entrepreneurship. In the United Kingdom, Labour Party leader Neil Kinnock made a public attack against the entryist group Militant at the 1985 Labour Party conference. The Labour Party ruled that Militant was ineligible for affiliation with the Labour Party, and the party gradually expelled Militant supporters. The Kinnock leadership had refused to support the 1984–1985 miner’s strike over pit closures, a decision that the party’s left wing and the National Union of Mineworkers blamed for the strike’s eventual defeat. In 1989 at Stockholm, the 18th Congress of the Socialist International adopted a new Declaration of Principles, saying:
Democratic socialism is an international movement for freedom, social justice, and solidarity. Its goal is to achieve a peaceful world where these basic values can be enhanced and where each individual can live a meaningful life with the full development of his or her personality and talents, and with the guarantee of human and civil rights in a democratic framework of society.[229]
In the 1990s, the British Labour Party under Tony Blair enacted policies based on the free market economy to deliver public services via the private finance initiative. Influential in these policies was the idea of a “Third Way” which called for a re-evaluation of welfare state policies.[230] In 1995, the Labour Party re-defined its stance on socialism by re-wording Clause IV of its constitution, effectively rejecting socialism by removing all references to public, direct worker or municipal ownership of the means of production. The Labour Party stated: “The Labour Party is a democratic socialist party. It believes that, by the strength of our common endeavour we achieve more than we achieve alone, so as to create, for each of us, the means to realise our true potential, and, for all of us, a community in which power, wealth, and opportunity are in the hands of the many, not the few”.[231]
African socialism has been and continues to be a major ideology around the continent. Julius Nyerere was inspired by Fabian socialist ideals.[232] He was a firm believer in rural Africans and their traditions and ujamaa, a system of collectivisation that according to Nyerere was present before European imperialism. Essentially he believed Africans were already socialists. Other African socialists include Jomo Kenyatta, Kenneth Kaunda, Nelson Mandela and Kwame Nkrumah. Fela Kuti was inspired by socialism and called for a democratic African republic. In South Africa the African National Congress (ANC) abandoned its partial socialist allegiances after taking power and followed a standard neoliberal route. From 2005 through to 2007, the country was wracked by many thousands of protests from poor communities. One of these gave rise to a mass movement of shack dwellers, Abahlali baseMjondolo that despite major police suppression continues to work for popular people’s planning and against the creation of a market economy in land and housing.
Asia
In Asia, states with socialist economies—such as the People’s Republic of China, North Korea, Laos and Vietnam—have largely moved away from centralised economic planning in the 21st century, placing a greater emphasis on markets. Forms include the Chinese socialist market economy and the Vietnamese socialist-oriented market economy. They utilise state-owned corporate management models as opposed to modelling socialist enterprise on traditional management styles employed by government agencies. In China living standards continued to improve rapidly despite the late-2000s recession, but centralised political control remained tight.[233]Brian Reynolds Myers in his book The Cleanest Race, later supported by other academics,[234][235] dismisses the idea that Juche is North Korea’s leading ideology, regarding its public exaltation as designed to deceive foreigners and that it exists to be praised and not actually read,[236] pointing out that North Korea’s constitution of 2009 omits all mention of communism.[235]
Though the authority of the state remained unchallenged under Đổi Mới, the government of Vietnam encourages private ownership of farms and factories, economic deregulation and foreign investment, while maintaining control over strategic industries.[212] The Vietnamese economy subsequently achieved strong growth in agricultural and industrial production, construction, exports and foreign investment. However, these reforms have also caused a rise in income inequality and gender disparities.[237][238]
Elsewhere in Asia, some elected socialist parties and communist parties remain prominent, particularly in India and Nepal. The Communist Party of Nepal[which?] in particular calls for multi-party democracy, social equality and economic prosperity.[239] In Singapore, a majority of the GDP is still generated from the state sector comprising government-linked companies.[240] In Japan, there has been a resurgent interest in the Japanese Communist Party among workers and youth.[241][242] In Malaysia, the Socialist Party of Malaysia got its first Member of Parliament, Dr. Jeyakumar Devaraj, after the 2008 general election. In 2010, there were 270 kibbutzim in Israel. Their factories and farms account for 9% of Israel’s industrial output, worth US$8 billion and 40% of its agricultural output, worth over $1.7 billion.[243] Some Kibbutzim had also developed substantial high-tech and military industries. Also in 2010, Kibbutz Sasa, containing some 200 members, generated $850 million in annual revenue from its military-plastics industry.[244]
The United Nations World Happiness Report 2013 shows that the happiest nations are concentrated in Northern Europe, where the Nordic model of social democracy is employed, with Denmark topping the list. This is at times attributed to the success of the Nordic model in the region. The Nordic countries ranked highest on the metrics of real GDP per capita, healthy life expectancy, having someone to count on, perceived freedom to make life choices, generosity and freedom from corruption.[245] Indeed, the indicators of Freedom in the World have listed Scandinavian countries as ranking high on indicators such as press and economic freedom.
The objectives of the Party of European Socialists, the European Parliament’s socialist and social democratic bloc, are now “to pursue international aims in respect of the principles on which the European Union is based, namely principles of freedom, equality, solidarity, democracy, respect of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, and respect for the Rule of Law”. As a result, today the rallying cry of the French Revolution—Liberté, égalité, fraternité—is promoted as essential socialist values.[246] To the left of the PES at the European level is the Party of the European Left (PEL), also commonly abbreviated “European Left”), which is a political party at the European level and an association of democratic socialist, socialist[247] and communist[247] political parties in the European Union and other European countries. It was formed in January 2004 for the purposes of running in the 2004 European Parliament elections. PEL was founded on 8–9 May 2004 in Rome.[248] Elected MEPs from member parties of the European Left sit in the European United Left–Nordic Green Left (GUE/NGL) group in the European parliament.
The socialist Left Party in Germany grew in popularity[249] due to dissatisfaction with the increasingly neoliberal policies of the SPD, becoming the fourth biggest party in parliament in the general election on 27 September 2009.[250] Communist candidate Dimitris Christofias won a crucial presidential runoff in Cyprus, defeating his conservative rival with a majority of 53%.[251] In Ireland, in the 2009 European electionJoe Higgins of the Socialist Party took one of three seats in the capital Dublin European constituency.
In France, Olivier Besancenot, the Revolutionary Communist League (LCR) candidate in the 2007 presidential election, received 1,498,581 votes, 4.08%, double that of the communist candidate.[267] The LCR abolished itself in 2009 to initiate a broad anti-capitalist party, the New Anticapitalist Party, whose stated aim is to “build a new socialist, democratic perspective for the twenty-first century”.[268]
On 25 May 2014, the Spanish left-wing party Podemos entered candidates for the 2014 European parliamentary elections, some of which were unemployed. In a surprise result, it polled 7.98% of the vote and thus was awarded five seats out of 54[269][270] while the older United Left was the third largest overall force obtaining 10.03% and 5 seats, 4 more than the previous elections.[271]
According to a 2013 article in The Guardian, “[c]ontrary to popular belief, Americans don’t have an innate allergy to socialism. Milwaukee has had several socialist mayors (Frank Zeidler, Emil Seidel and Daniel Hoan), and there is currently an independent socialist in the US Senate, Bernie Sanders of Vermont”.[275] Sanders, once mayor of Vermont’s largest city, Burlington, has described himself as a democratic socialist[276][277] and has praised Scandinavian-style social democracy.[278][279] In 2016, Sanders made a bid for the Democratic Party presidential candidate, thereby gaining considerable popular support, particularly among the younger generation, but lost the nomination to Hillary Clinton.
For the Encyclopedia Britannica, “the attempt by Salvador Allende to unite Marxists and other reformers in a socialist reconstruction of Chile is most representative of the direction that Latin American socialists have taken since the late 20th century. […] Several socialist (or socialist-leaning) leaders have followed Allende’s example in winning election to office in Latin American countries”.[75] Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega, Bolivian President Evo Morales and Ecuadorian president Rafael Correa refer to their political programmes as socialist and Chávez adopted the term “socialism of the 21st century“. After winning re-election in December 2006, Chávez said: “Now more than ever, I am obliged to move Venezuela’s path towards socialism”.[281] Chávez was also reelected in October 2012 for his third six-year term as President, but he died in March 2013 from cancer. After Chávez’s death on 5 March 2013, Vice President from Chavez’s party Nicolás Maduro assumed the powers and responsibilities of the President. A special election was held on 14 April of the same year to elect a new President, which Maduro won by a tight margin as the candidate of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela and he was formally inaugurated on 19 April.[282] “Pink tide” is a term being used in contemporary 21st-century political analysis in the media and elsewhere to describe the perception that leftist ideology in general and left-wing politics in particular are increasingly influential in Latin America.[283][284][285]
Australia saw an increase in interest of socialism in the early 21st century, especially amongst youth.[287] It is strongest in Victoria, where three socialist parties have merged into the Victorian Socialists, who aim to address problems in housing and public transportation.
New Zealand has a small socialist scene, mainly dominated by Trotskyist groups. The current prime minister Jacinda Ardern has publicly condemned capitalism but describes herself as a social democrat.[citation needed]
Melanesian Socialism developed in the 1980s, inspired by African Socialism. It aims to achieve full independence from Britain and France in Melanesian territories and creation of a Melanesian federal union. It is very popular with the New Caledonia independence movement.[citation needed]
The fundamental objective of socialism is to attain an advanced level of material production and therefore greater productivity, efficiency and rationality as compared to capitalism and all previous systems, under the view that an expansion of human productive capability is the basis for the extension of freedom and equality in society.[292] Many forms of socialist theory hold that human behaviour is largely shaped by the social environment. In particular, socialism holds that social mores, values, cultural traits and economic practices are social creations and not the result of an immutable natural law.[293][294] The object of their critique is thus not human avarice or human consciousness, but the material conditions and man-made social systems (i.e. the economic structure of society) that gives rise to observed social problems and inefficiencies. Bertrand Russell, often considered to be the father of analytic philosophy, identified as a socialist. Russell opposed the class struggle aspects of Marxism, viewing socialism solely as an adjustment of economic relations to accommodate modern machine production to benefit all of humanity through the progressive reduction of necessary work time.[295]
Socialists view creativity as an essential aspect of human nature and define freedom as a state of being where individuals are able to express their creativity unhindered by constraints of both material scarcity and coercive social institutions.[296] The socialist concept of individuality is thus intertwined with the concept of individual creative expression. Karl Marx believed that expansion of the productive forces and technology was the basis for the expansion of human freedom and that socialism, being a system that is consistent with modern developments in technology, would enable the flourishing of “free individualities” through the progressive reduction of necessary labour time. The reduction of necessary labour time to a minimum would grant individuals the opportunity to pursue the development of their true individuality and creativity.[297]
Criticism of capitalism
Socialists argue that the accumulation of capital generates waste through externalities that require costly corrective regulatory measures. They also point out that this process generates wasteful industries and practices that exist only to generate sufficient demand for products to be sold at a profit (such as high-pressure advertisement), thereby creating rather than satisfying economic demand.[298][299]
Socialists argue that capitalism consists of irrational activity, such as the purchasing of commodities only to sell at a later time when their price appreciates, rather than for consumption, even if the commodity cannot be sold at a profit to individuals in need and therefore a crucial criticism often made by socialists is that “making money”, or accumulation of capital, does not correspond to the satisfaction of demand (the production of use-values).[300] The fundamental criterion for economic activity in capitalism is the accumulation of capital for reinvestment in production, but this spurs the development of new, non-productive industries that do not produce use-value and only exist to keep the accumulation process afloat (otherwise the system goes into crisis), such as the spread of the financial industry, contributing to the formation of economic bubbles.[301]
Socialists view private property relations as limiting the potential of productive forces in the economy. According to socialists, private property becomes obsolete when it concentrates into centralised, socialised institutions based on private appropriation of revenue—but based on cooperative work and internal planning in allocation of inputs—until the role of the capitalist becomes redundant.[302] With no need for capital accumulation and a class of owners, private property in the means of production is perceived as being an outdated form of economic organisation that should be replaced by a free association of individuals based on public or common ownership of these socialised assets.[303][304] Private ownership imposes constraints on planning, leading to uncoordinated economic decisions that result in business fluctuations, unemployment and a tremendous waste of material resources during crisis of overproduction.[305]
Excessive disparities in income distribution lead to social instability and require costly corrective measures in the form of redistributive taxation, which incurs heavy administrative costs while weakening the incentive to work, inviting dishonesty and increasing the likelihood of tax evasion while (the corrective measures) reduce the overall efficiency of the market economy.[306] These corrective policies limit the incentive system of the market by providing things such as minimum wages, unemployment insurance, taxing profits and reducing the reserve army of labour, resulting in reduced incentives for capitalists to invest in more production. In essence, social welfare policies cripple capitalism and its incentive system and are thus unsustainable in the long-run.[307] Marxists argue that the establishment of a socialist mode of production is the only way to overcome these deficiencies. Socialists and specifically Marxian socialists argue that the inherent conflict of interests between the working class and capital prevent optimal use of available human resources and leads to contradictory interest groups (labour and business) striving to influence the state to intervene in the economy in their favour at the expense of overall economic efficiency.
Early socialists (utopian socialists and Ricardian socialists) criticised capitalism for concentrating power and wealth within a small segment of society.[308] In addition, they complained that capitalism does not utilise available technology and resources to their maximum potential in the interests of the public.[304]
At a certain stage of development, the material productive forces of society come into conflict with the existing relations of production or—this merely expresses the same thing in legal terms – with the property relations within the framework of which they have operated hitherto. Then begins an era of social revolution. The changes in the economic foundation lead sooner or later to the transformation of the whole immense superstructure.
Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels argued that socialism would emerge from historical necessity as capitalism rendered itself obsolete and unsustainable from increasing internal contradictions emerging from the development of the productive forces and technology. It was these advances in the productive forces combined with the old social relations of production of capitalism that would generate contradictions, leading to working-class consciousness.[310]
Marx and Engels held the view that the consciousness of those who earn a wage or salary (the working class in the broadest Marxist sense) would be moulded by their conditions of wage slavery, leading to a tendency to seek their freedom or emancipation by overthrowing ownership of the means of production by capitalists and consequently, overthrowing the state that upheld this economic order. For Marx and Engels, conditions determine consciousness and ending the role of the capitalist class leads eventually to a classless society in which the state would wither away. The Marxist conception of socialism is that of a specific historical phase that would displace capitalism and precede communism. The major characteristics of socialism (particularly as conceived by Marx and Engels after the Paris Commune of 1871) are that the proletariat would control the means of production through a workers’ state erected by the workers in their interests. Economic activity would still be organised through the use of incentive systems and social classes would still exist, but to a lesser and diminishing extent than under capitalism.
For orthodox Marxists, socialism is the lower stage of communism based on the principle of “from each according to his ability, to each according to his contribution” while upper stage communism is based on the principle of “from each according to his ability, to each according to his need“, the upper stage becoming possible only after the socialist stage further develops economic efficiency and the automation of production has led to a superabundance of goods and services.[311][312] Marx argued that the material productive forces (in industry and commerce) brought into existence by capitalism predicated a cooperative society since production had become a mass social, collective activity of the working class to create commodities but with private ownership (the relations of production or property relations). This conflict between collective effort in large factories and private ownership would bring about a conscious desire in the working class to establish collective ownership commensurate with the collective efforts their daily experience.[309]
Role of the state
Socialists have taken different perspectives on the state and the role it should play in revolutionary struggles, in constructing socialism and within an established socialist economy.
In the 19th century the philosophy of state socialism was first explicitly expounded by the German political philosopher Ferdinand Lassalle. In contrast to Karl Marx’s perspective of the state, Lassalle rejected the concept of the state as a class-based power structure whose main function was to preserve existing class structures. Thus Lassalle also rejected the Marxist view that the state was destined to “wither away”. Lassalle considered the state to be an entity independent of class allegiances and an instrument of justice that would therefore be essential for achieving socialism.[313]
Preceding the Bolshevik-led revolution in Russia, many socialists including reformists, orthodox Marxist currents such as council communism, anarchists and libertarian socialists criticised the idea of using the state to conduct central planning and own the means of production as a way to establish socialism. Following the victory of Leninism in Russia, the idea of “state socialism” spread rapidly throughout the socialist movement and eventually state socialism came to be identified with the Soviet economic model.[314]
Joseph Schumpeter rejected the association of socialism (and social ownership) with state ownership over the means of production because the state as it exists in its current form is a product of capitalist society and cannot be transplanted to a different institutional framework. Schumpeter argued that there would be different institutions within socialism than those that exist within modern capitalism, just as feudalism had its own distinct and unique institutional forms. The state, along with concepts like property and taxation, were concepts exclusive to commercial society (capitalism) and attempting to place them within the context of a future socialist society would amount to a distortion of these concepts by using them out of context.[315]
Utopian socialism is a term used to define the first currents of modern socialist thought as exemplified by the work of Henri de Saint-Simon, Charles Fourier and Robert Owen, which inspired Karl Marx and other early socialists.[316] However, visions of imaginary ideal societies, which competed with revolutionary social democratic movements, were viewed as not being grounded in the material conditions of society and as reactionary.[317] Although it is technically possible for any set of ideas or any person living at any time in history to be a utopian socialist, the term is most often applied to those socialists who lived in the first quarter of the 19th century who were ascribed the label “utopian” by later socialists as a negative term in order to imply naivete and dismiss their ideas as fanciful or unrealistic.[79]
Religious sects whose members live communally such as the Hutterites, for example, are not usually called “utopian socialists”, although their way of living is a prime example. They have been categorised as religious socialists by some. Likewise, modern intentional communities based on socialist ideas could also be categorised as “utopian socialist”.
For Marxists, the development of capitalism in Western Europe provided a material basis for the possibility of bringing about socialism because according to The Communist Manifesto “[w]hat the bourgeoisie produces above all is its own grave diggers”,[318] namely the working class, which must become conscious of the historical objectives set it by society.
Revolutionary socialists believe that a social revolution is necessary to effect structural changes to the socioeconomic structure of society. Among revolutionary socialists there are differences in strategy, theory and the definition of “revolution”. Orthodox Marxists and left communists take an impossibilist stance, believing that revolution should be spontaneous as a result of contradictions in society due to technological changes in the productive forces. Lenin theorised that under capitalism the workers cannot achieve class consciousness beyond organising into unions and making demands of the capitalists. Therefore, Leninists advocate that it is historically necessary for a vanguard of class conscious revolutionaries to take a central role in coordinating the social revolution to overthrow the capitalist state and eventually the institution of the state altogether.[319] “Revolution” is not necessarily defined by revolutionary socialists as violent insurrection,[320] but as a complete dismantling and rapid transformation of all areas of class society led by the majority of the masses: the working class.
Reformism is generally associated with social democracy and gradualist democratic socialism. Reformism is the belief that socialists should stand in parliamentary elections within capitalist society and if elected utilise the machinery of government to pass political and social reforms for the purposes of ameliorating the instabilities and inequities of capitalism.
Socialist economics starts from the premise that “individuals do not live or work in isolation but live in cooperation with one another. Furthermore, everything that people produce is in some sense a social product, and everyone who contributes to the production of a good is entitled to a share in it. Society as a whole, therefore, should own or at least control property for the benefit of all its members”.[88]
The original conception of socialism was an economic system whereby production was organised in a way to directly produce goods and services for their utility (or use-value in classical and Marxian economics): the direct allocation of resources in terms of physical units as opposed to financial calculation and the economic laws of capitalism (see law of value), often entailing the end of capitalistic economic categories such as rent, interest, profit and money.[321] In a fully developed socialist economy, production and balancing factor inputs with outputs becomes a technical process to be undertaken by engineers.[322]
Market socialism refers to an array of different economic theories and systems that utilise the market mechanism to organise production and to allocate factor inputs among socially owned enterprises, with the economic surplus (profits) accruing to society in a social dividend as opposed to private capital owners.[323] Variations of market socialism include libertarian proposals such as mutualism, based on classical economics, and neoclassical economic models such as the Lange Model. However, some economists such as Joseph Stiglitz, Mancur Olson and others not specifically advancing anti-socialists positions have shown that prevailing economic models upon which such democratic or market socialism models might be based have logical flaws or unworkable presuppositions.[324][325]
Management and control over the activities of enterprises are based on self-management and self-governance, with equal power-relations in the workplace to maximise occupational autonomy. A socialist form of organisation would eliminate controlling hierarchies so that only a hierarchy based on technical knowledge in the workplace remains. Every member would have decision-making power in the firm and would be able to participate in establishing its overall policy objectives. The policies/goals would be carried out by the technical specialists that form the coordinating hierarchy of the firm, who would establish plans or directives for the work community to accomplish these goals.[329]
The role and use of money in a hypothetical socialist economy is a contested issue. According to the Austrian school economist Ludwig von Mises, an economic system that does not use money, financial calculation and market pricing would be unable to effectively value capital goods and coordinate production and therefore these types of socialism are impossible because they lack the necessary information to perform economic calculation in the first place.[330][331] Socialists including Karl Marx, Robert Owen, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon and John Stuart Mill advocated various forms of labour vouchers or labour credits, which like money would be used to acquire articles of consumption, but unlike money they are unable to become capital and would not be used to allocate resources within the production process. Bolshevik revolutionary Leon Trotsky argued that money could not be arbitrarily abolished following a socialist revolution. Money had to exhaust its “historic mission”, meaning it would have to be used until its function became redundant, eventually being transformed into bookkeeping receipts for statisticians and only in the more distant future would money not be required for even that role.[332]
The economic anarchy of capitalist society as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of the evil… I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy, accompanied by an educational system which would be oriented toward social goals. In such an economy, the means of production are owned by society itself and are utilised in a planned fashion. A planned economy, which adjusts production to the needs of the community, would distribute the work to be done among all those able to work and would guarantee a livelihood to every man, woman, and child. The education of the individual, in addition to promoting his own innate abilities, would attempt to develop in him a sense of responsibility for his fellow men in place of the glorification of power and success in our present society.
A planned economy is a type of economy consisting of a mixture of public ownership of the means of production and the coordination of production and distribution through economic planning. There are two major types of planning: decentralised-planning and centralised-planning. Enrico Barone provided a comprehensive theoretical framework for a planned socialist economy. In his model, assuming perfect computation techniques, simultaneous equations relating inputs and outputs to ratios of equivalence would provide appropriate valuations in order to balance supply and demand.[334]
The most prominent example of a planned economy was the economic system of the Soviet Union and as such the centralised-planned economic model is usually associated with the communist states of the 20th century, where it was combined with a single-party political system. In a centrally planned economy, decisions regarding the quantity of goods and services to be produced are planned in advance by a planning agency (see also the analysis of Soviet-type economic planning). The economic systems of the Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc are further classified as “command economies”, which are defined as systems where economic coordination is undertaken by commands, directives and production targets.[335] Studies by economists of various political persuasions on the actual functioning of the Soviet economy indicate that it was not actually a planned economy. Instead of conscious planning, the Soviet economy was based on a process whereby the plan was modified by localised agents and the original plans went largely unfulfilled. Planning agencies, ministries and enterprises all adapted and bargained with each other during the formulation of the plan as opposed to following a plan passed down from a higher authority, leading some economists to suggest that planning did not actually take place within the Soviet economy and that a better description would be an “administered” or “managed” economy.[336]
Although central planning was largely supported by Marxist–Leninists, some factions within the Soviet Union before the rise of Stalinism held positions contrary to central planning. Leon Trotsky rejected central planning in favour of decentralised planning. He argued that central planners, regardless of their intellectual capacity, would be unable to coordinate effectively all economic activity within an economy because they operated without the input and tacit knowledge embodied by the participation of the millions of people in the economy. As a result, central planners would be unable to respond to local economic conditions.[337]State socialism is unfeasible in this view because information cannot be aggregated by a central body and effectively used to formulate a plan for an entire economy, because doing so would result in distorted or absent price signals.[338]
A self-managed, decentralised economy is based on autonomous self-regulating economic units and a decentralised mechanism of resource allocation and decision-making. This model has found support in notable classical and neoclassical economists including Alfred Marshall, John Stuart Mill and Jaroslav Vanek. There are numerous variations of self-management, including labour-managed firms and worker-managed firms. The goals of self-management are to eliminate exploitation and reduce alienation.[339]Guild socialism is a political movement advocating workers’ control of industry through the medium of trade-related guilds “in an implied contractual relationship with the public”.[340] It originated in the United Kingdom and was at its most influential in the first quarter of the 20th century.[340] It was strongly associated with G. D. H. Cole and influenced by the ideas of William Morris.
One such system is the cooperative economy, a largely free market economy in which workers manage the firms and democratically determine remuneration levels and labour divisions. Productive resources would be legally owned by the cooperative and rented to the workers, who would enjoy usufruct rights.[341] Another form of decentralised planning is the use of cybernetics, or the use of computers to manage the allocation of economic inputs. The socialist-run government of Salvador Allende in Chile experimented with Project Cybersyn, a real-time information bridge between the government, state enterprises and consumers.[342] Another, more recent variant is participatory economics, wherein the economy is planned by decentralised councils of workers and consumers. Workers would be remunerated solely according to effort and sacrifice, so that those engaged in dangerous, uncomfortable and strenuous work would receive the highest incomes and could thereby work less.[343] A contemporary model for a self-managed, non-market socialism is Pat Devine‘s model of negotiated coordination. Negotiated coordination is based upon social ownership by those affected by the use of the assets involved, with decisions made by those at the most localised level of production.[344]
Michel Bauwens identifies the emergence of the open software movement and peer-to-peer production as a new alternative mode of production to the capitalist economy and centrally planned economy that is based on collaborative self-management, common ownership of resources and the production of use-values through the free cooperation of producers who have access to distributed capital.[345]
The economy of the former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia established a system based on market-based allocation, social ownership of the means of production and self-management within firms. This system substituted Yugoslavia’s Soviet-type central planning with a decentralised, self-managed system after reforms in 1953.[349]
The Marxian economistRichard D. Wolff argues that “re-organising production so that workers become collectively self-directed at their work-sites” not only moves society beyond both capitalism and state socialism of the last century, but would also mark another milestone in human history, similar to earlier transitions out of slavery and feudalism.[350] As an example, Wolff claims that Mondragon is “a stunningly successful alternative to the capitalist organisation of production”.[351]
State socialism can be used to classify any variety of socialist philosophies that advocates the ownership of the means of production by the state apparatus, either as a transitional stage between capitalism and socialism, or as an end-goal in itself. Typically it refers to a form of technocratic management, whereby technical specialists administer or manage economic enterprises on behalf of society (and the public interest) instead of workers’ councils or workplace democracy.
A state-directed economy may refer to a type of mixed economy consisting of public ownership over large industries, as promoted by various Social democratic political parties during the 20th century. This ideology influenced the policies of the British Labour Party during Clement Attlee’s administration. In the biography of the 1945 United Kingdom Labour Party Prime Minister Clement Attlee, Francis Beckett states: “[T]he government… wanted what would become known as a mixed economy”.[352]
Nationalisation in the United Kingdom was achieved through compulsory purchase of the industry (i.e. with compensation). British Aerospace was a combination of major aircraft companies British Aircraft Corporation, Hawker Siddeley and others. British Shipbuilders was a combination of the major shipbuilding companies including Cammell Laird, Govan Shipbuilders, Swan Hunter and Yarrow Shipbuilders, whereas the nationalisation of the coal mines in 1947 created a coal board charged with running the coal industry commercially so as to be able to meet the interest payable on the bonds which the former mine owners’ shares had been converted into.[353][354]
Market socialism consists of publicly owned or cooperatively owned enterprises operating in a market economy. It is a system that utilises the market and monetary prices for the allocation and accounting of the means of production, thereby retaining the process of capital accumulation. The profit generated would be used to directly remunerate employees, collectively sustain the enterprise or finance public institutions.[355] In state-oriented forms of market socialism, in which state enterprises attempt to maximise profit, the profits can be used to fund government programs and services through a social dividend, eliminating or greatly diminishing the need for various forms of taxation that exist in capitalist systems. Neoclassical economistLéon Walras believed that a socialist economy based on state ownership of land and natural resources would provide a means of public finance to make income taxes unnecessary.[356] Yugoslavia implemented a market socialist economy based on cooperatives and worker self-management.
Mutualism is an economic theory and anarchist school of thought that advocates a society where each person might possess a means of production, either individually or collectively, with trade representing equivalent amounts of labour in the free market.[357] Integral to the scheme was the establishment of a mutual-credit bank that would lend to producers at a minimal interest rate, just high enough to cover administration.[358] Mutualism is based on a labour theory of value that holds that when labour or its product is sold, in exchange it ought to receive goods or services embodying “the amount of labour necessary to produce an article of exactly similar and equal utility”.[359]
The current economic system in China is formally referred to as a socialist market economy with Chinese characteristics. It combines a large state sector that comprises the commanding heights of the economy, which are guaranteed their public ownership status by law,[360] with a private sector mainly engaged in commodity production and light industry responsible from anywhere between 33%[361] to over 70% of GDP generated in 2005.[362] Although there has been a rapid expansion of private-sector activity since the 1980s, privatisation of state assets was virtually halted and were partially reversed in 2005.[363] The current Chinese economy consists of 150 corporatised state-owned enterprises that report directly to China’s central government.[364] By 2008, these state-owned corporations had become increasingly dynamic and generated large increases in revenue for the state,[365][366] resulting in a state-sector led recovery during the 2009 financial crises while accounting for most of China’s economic growth.[367] However, the Chinese economic model is widely cited as a contemporary form of state capitalism, the major difference between Western capitalism and the Chinese model being the degree of state-ownership of shares in publicly listed corporations.
The Socialist Republic of Vietnam has adopted a similar model after the Doi Moi economic renovation, but slightly differs from the Chinese model in that the Vietnamese government retains firm control over the state sector and strategic industries, but allows for private-sector activity in commodity production.[368]
The major socialist political movements are described below. Independent socialist theorists, utopian socialist authors and academic supporters of socialism may not be represented in these movements. Some political groups have called themselves socialist while holding views that some consider antithetical to socialism. The term “socialist” has also been used by some politicians on the political right as an epithet against certain individuals who do not consider themselves to be socialists and against policies that are not considered socialist by their proponents.
There are many variations of socialism and as such there is no single definition encapsulating all of socialism. However, there have been common elements identified by scholars.[369] In his Dictionary of Socialism (1924), Angelo S. Rappoport analysed forty definitions of socialism to conclude that common elements of socialism include: general criticisms of the social effects of private ownership and control of capital—as being the cause of poverty, low wages, unemployment, economic and social inequality and a lack of economic security; a general view that the solution to these problems is a form of collective control over the means of production, distribution and exchange (the degree and means of control vary amongst socialist movements); an agreement that the outcome of this collective control should be a society based upon social justice, including social equality, economic protection of people and should provide a more satisfying life for most people.[370] In The Concepts of Socialism (1975), Bhikhu Parekh identifies four core principles of socialism and particularly socialist society: sociality, social responsibility, cooperation and planning.[371] In his study Ideologies and Political Theory (1996), Michael Freeden states that all socialists share five themes: the first is that socialism posits that society is more than a mere collection of individuals; second, that it considers human welfare a desirable objective; third, that it considers humans by nature to be active and productive; fourth, it holds the belief of human equality; and fifth, that history is progressive and will create positive change on the condition that humans work to achieve such change.[371]
Modern democratic socialism is a broad political movement that seeks to promote the ideals of socialism within the context of a democratic system. Some democratic socialists support social democracy as a temporary measure to reform the current system while others reject reformism in favour of more revolutionary methods. Modern social democracy emphasises a program of gradual legislative modification of capitalism in order to make it more equitable and humane, while the theoretical end goal of building a socialist society is either completely forgotten or redefined in a pro-capitalist way. The two movements are widely similar both in terminology and in ideology, although there are a few key differences.
The major difference between social democracy and democratic socialism is the object of their politics: contemporary social democrats support a welfare state and unemployment insurance as a means to “humanise” capitalism, whereas democratic socialists seek to replace capitalism with a socialist economic system, arguing that any attempt to “humanise” capitalism through regulations and welfare policies would distort the market and create economic contradictions.[389]
Democratic socialism generally refers to any political movement that seeks to establish an economy based on economic democracy by and for the working class. Democratic socialism is difficult to define and groups of scholars have radically different definitions for the term. Some definitions simply refer to all forms of socialism that follow an electoral, reformist or evolutionary path to socialism rather than a revolutionary one.[390]
You can’t talk about ending the slums without first saying profit must be taken out of slums. You’re really tampering and getting on dangerous ground because you are messing with folk then. You are messing with captains of industry. Now this means that we are treading in difficult water, because it really means that we are saying that something is wrong with capitalism. There must be a better distribution of wealth, and maybe America must move toward a democratic socialism.
Libertarian socialism (sometimes called social anarchism,[401][402]left-libertarianism[403][404] and socialist libertarianism)[405] is a group of anti-authoritarian[406] political philosophies inside the socialist movement that rejects socialism as centralised state ownership and control of the economy[407] including criticism of wage labour relationships within the workplace,[408] as well as the state itself.[409] It emphasises workers’ self-management of the workplace[409] and decentralised structures of political organisation,[410] asserting that a society based on freedom and equality can be achieved through abolishing authoritarian institutions that control certain means of production and subordinate the majority to an owning class or political and economic elite.[411] Libertarian socialists generally place their hopes in decentralised means of direct democracy and federal or confederal associations such as libertarian municipalism, citizens’ assemblies, trade unions, and workers’ councils.[412][413] Relatedly, anarcho-syndicalist Gaston Leval explained: “We therefore foresee a Society in which all activities will be coordinated, a structure that has, at the same time, sufficient flexibility to permit the greatest possible autonomy for social life, or for the life of each enterprise, and enough cohesiveness to prevent all disorder…In a well-organised society, all of these things must be systematically accomplished by means of parallel federations, vertically united at the highest levels, constituting one vast organism in which all economic functions will be performed in solidarity with all others and that will permanently preserve the necessary cohesion”. All of this is generally done within a general call for libertarian[414] and voluntary human relationships[415] through the identification, criticism and practical dismantling of illegitimate authority in all aspects of human life.[420] As such, libertarian socialism within the larger socialist movement seeks to distinguish itself both from Leninism/Bolshevism and from social democracy.[421]
Christian socialism is a broad concept involving an intertwining of the Christian religion with the politics and economic theories of socialism.
Islamic socialism is a term coined by various Muslim leaders to describe a more spiritual form of socialism. Muslim socialists believe that the teachings of the Qur’an and Muhammad are compatible with principles of equality and public ownership drawing inspiration from the early Medina welfare state established by Muhammad. Muslim socialists are more conservative than their western contemporaries and find their roots in anti-imperialism, anti-colonialism and Arab nationalism. Islamic socialist leaders believe in democracy and deriving legitimacy from public mandate as opposed to religious texts.
Social democracy is a political ideology which “is derived from a socialist tradition of political thought. Many social democrats refer to themselves as socialists or democratic socialists, and some, for example Tony Blair, use or have used these terms interchangeably.[429][430][431] Others have opined that there are clear differences between the three terms, and preferred to describe their own political beliefs by using the term ‘social democracy’ only”.[432] There are two main directions, either to establish democratic socialism, or to build a welfare state within the framework of the capitalist system. The first variant has officially its goal by establishing democratic socialism through reformist and gradualist methods.[433] In the second variant, social democracy becomes a policy regime involving a welfare state, collective bargaining schemes, support for publicly financed public services and a capitalist-based economy like a mixed economy. It is often used in this manner to refer to the social models and economic policies prominent in Western and Northern Europe during the later half of the 20th century.[434][435] It has been described by Jerry Mander as “hybrid” economics, an active collaboration of capitalist and socialist visions and while such systems are not perfect they tend to provide high standards of living.[436] Numerous studies and surveys indicate that people tend to live happier lives in social democratic societies rather than neoliberal ones.[437][438][439][440]
Many socialists were early advocates for LGBT rights. For early socialist Charles Fourier, true freedom could only occur without suppressing passions, as the suppression of passions is not only destructive to the individual, but to society as a whole. Writing before the advent of the term “homosexuality”, Fourier recognised that both men and women have a wide range of sexual needs and preferences which may change throughout their lives, including same-sex sexuality and androgénité. He argued that all sexual expressions should be enjoyed as long as people are not abused and that “affirming one’s difference” can actually enhance social integration.[464] In Oscar Wilde‘s The Soul of Man Under Socialism, he passionately advocates for an egalitarian society where wealth is shared by all, while warning of the dangers of social systems that crush individuality. Wilde’s libertarian socialist politics were shared by other figures who actively campaigned for homosexual emancipation in the late 19th century such as Edward Carpenter.[465]The Intermediate Sex: A Study of Some Transitional Types of Men and Women was a book from 1908 and an early work arguing for gay liberation written by Edward Carpenter[466] who was also an influential personality in the foundation of the Fabian Society and the Labour Party. After the Russian Revolution under the leadership of Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky, the Soviet Union abolished previous laws against homosexuality.[467]Harry Hay was an early leader in the American LGBT rights movement as well as a member of the Communist Party USA. He is known for his roles in helping to found several gay organisations, including the Mattachine Society, the first sustained gay rights group in the United States which in its early days had a strong Marxist influence. The Encyclopedia of Homosexuality reports that “[a]s Marxists the founders of the group believed that the injustice and oppression which they suffered stemmed from relationships deeply embedded in the structure of American society”.[468] Also emerging from a number of events, such as the May 1968 insurrection in France, the anti-Vietnam war movement in the United States and the Stonewall riots of 1969, militant gay liberation organisations began to spring up around the world. Many saw their roots in left radicalism more than in the established homophile groups of the time,[469] though the Gay Liberation Front took an anti-capitalist stance and attacked the nuclear family and traditional gender roles.[470]
Eco-socialism, green socialism or socialist ecology is a political position merging aspects of Marxism, socialism and/or libertarian socialism with that of green politics, ecology and alter-globalisation. Eco-socialists generally believe that the expansion of the capitalist system is the cause of social exclusion, poverty, war and environmental degradation through globalisation and imperialism, under the supervision of repressive states and transnational structures.[471] Contrary to the depiction of Karl Marx by some environmentalists,[472]social ecologists[473] and fellow socialists[474] as a productivist who favoured the domination of nature, eco-socialists have revisited Marx’s writings and believe that he “was a main originator of the ecological world-view”.[475] Eco-socialist authors, like John Bellamy Foster[476] and Paul Burkett,[477] point to Marx’s discussion of a “metabolic rift” between man and nature, his statement that “private ownership of the globe by single individuals will appear quite absurd as private ownership of one man by another” and his observation that a society must “hand it [the planet] down to succeeding generations in an improved condition”.[478] The English socialist William Morris is largely credited with developing key principles of what was later called eco-socialism.[479] During the 1880s and 1890s, Morris promoted his eco-socialist ideas within the Social Democratic Federation and Socialist League.[480]Green anarchism, or ecoanarchism, is a school of thought within anarchism which puts a particular emphasis on environmental issues. An important early influence was the thought of the American anarchistHenry David Thoreau and his book Walden[481] and Élisée Reclus.[482][483]
Syndicalism is a social movement that operates through industrial trade unions and rejects state socialism and the use of establishment politics to establish or promote socialism. They reject using state power to construct a socialist society, favouring strategies such as the general strike. Syndicalists advocate a socialist economy based on federated unions or syndicates of workers who own and manage the means of production. Some Marxist currents advocate syndicalism, such as De-Leonism. Anarcho-syndicalism is a theory of anarchism which views syndicalism as a method for workers in capitalist society to gain control of an economy and with that control influence broader society. The Spanish Revolution largely orchestrated by the anarcho-syndicalist trade union CNT during the Spanish Civil War offers an historical example.[493] The International Workers’ Association is an international federation of anarcho-syndicalistlabour unions and initiatives.
Story 2: Progressive Socialist Democrats Want To Impeach Trump — Speaker Pelosi Calls For Meeting To Discuss Fake Impeachment Vs. Real Impreachment — Please Impeach and Lose The House By 30 Plus Seats — Videos.
Nancy Pelosi calls for special meeting with House Democrats to discuss party views on impeachment
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., speaks during a weekly news conference on May 16 on Capitol Hill. Pelosi is dealing with rising calls for impeachment proceedings against President Trump.
Zach Gibson/Getty Images
Updated at 4:19 p.m. ET
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will convene a meeting Wednesday morning to hear from Democrats on whether to move forward with impeachment proceedings against President Trump.
Pelosi, a public skeptic of impeachment, is confronting a rising tide of support for it among rank-and-file House Democrats and members of her own leadership team. Democrats are outraged by the Trump administration’s ongoing effort to stymie congressional oversight into the president, his administration, and the findings in special counsel Robert Mueller’s report.
“She’s hearing the views of the caucus, and listening to different perspectives and we’re having that debate,” said Rep. Seth Moulton, D-Mass., who is running for president. Moulton supports opening an impeachment inquiry based on the argument being made by a number of Democrats that it gives the House a stronger legal hand in securing documents, testimony and cooperation from the Trump administration.
“I don’t think there’s any question but there’s a growing realization in the caucus that impeachment is inevitable. It’s not a question of if but when,” said Rep. John Yarmuth, D-Ky., a member of the leadership’s whip team. Yarmuth said the administration’s “blanket resistance” to their oversight efforts is changing the calculation. “I think the speaker is right that these investigations need to go on. I don’t think they should go on interminably,” he said, adding that he expected a decision on impeachment to be made by the end of the summer.
Yarmuth and other top leaders have characterized those pushing for impeachment as a small but growing minority dissatisfied with Pelosi’s focus on traditional committee investigations. The group largely confined their frustrations to closed-door sessions until recently.
“I think what is happening is that the initial aim was to investigate and then see what we had. The problem is we can’t get any information. The president is blocking us,” House Oversight and Reform Committee Chairman Elijah Cummings, D-Md., said. “I think we’re in a position where we’re moving more and more towards [impeachment] because he’s not leaving us with any choices. You don’t have any choices.”
Cummings maintained that moving ahead with impeachment could assist their efforts. “Once you file for impeachment you’re under a whole new different set of rules. And you have a much broader opportunity to get things.”
Rep. David Cicilline, D-R.I., a member of the Judiciary Committee and party leadership who supports moving forward with impeachment, said “the principal reason” to do so was to send a message to the administration and the public. “There’s no question that opening impeachment conveys to all the relevant parties the seriousness of the inquiry. I think we still have the ability to get all the documents and the witnesses that we need under our traditional oversight responsibilities,” he said, adding, “It’s important to communicate a very strong message to the administration, and opening a formal inquiry is a good way to communicate that message.”
House Democratic Caucus Chairman Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., downplayed the internal turmoil, telling reporters Tuesday: “I disagree with the notion that a growing number of the House Democratic Caucus want to jump straight to impeachment,” he said. However, he said, Democrats have a “responsibility to serve as a check and balance on an out-of-control executive branch.”
Trump’s latest efforts to block former White House counsel Don McGahn from testifying Tuesday before the House Judiciary Committee, and McGahn’s refusal to appear, are the latest affront to Congress prompting Democrats to reconsider their strategy. “We will hold this president accountable, one way or the other,” Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., said at the hearing.
Citing executive privilege, the administration has also blocked congressional demands for an unredacted copy of Mueller’s report, which Attorney General William Barr declined to deliver to the Judiciary Committee. Barr was held in contempt by the committee, but a full House vote is not yet scheduled.
On another front, the administration is refusing to comply with Ways and Means Chairman Richard Neal’s request for six years of the president’s tax returns, which tax law gives the chairman legal authority to access.
House Financial Services Committee Chairwoman Maxine Waters, D-Calif., one of the first House Democrats to call for Trump’s impeachment, said those tactics from the administration are accelerating the impeachment push.
“I think many members are a little bit shocked and surprised that the president would be this blatant in instructing those in the administration and outside the administration not to come and testify,” Waters said. “I think what he’s trying to do and I think what they think he’s trying to do is render us toothless and say we’re not that important.”
While Democrats are waging the battle against the administration in the courts — andthe courts have historically favored Congress in these cases — it can take months or years to reach final legal conclusions, and Democrats believe Trump is using these court fights as a delaying tactic to get past the 2020 elections.
House Democrats did score a significant legal victory on Monday when federal Judge Amit Mehta ruled that an accounting company, Mazars, must comply with a subpoena issued by Cummings. Trump said hours later that there would be an appeal, and on Tuesday morning papers were filed to continue that fight.
Waters said she was pleased that the judge agreed with the Democrats’ argument in that case, but that process would be lengthy and does not absolve Congress from its responsibility to act.
Politically, Democrats remain in the same bind. Pelosi’s stated threshold for “overwhelming and bipartisan” support to move forward with impeachment hasn’t budged. While most Democrats want impeachment hearings to begin, the idea is still unpopular overall, according to the latest NPR/PBSNewsHour/Marist Poll.
“What about just doing the right thing?” Moulton said, when asked about the political calculus for Democrats.
That question is causing anxiety among some members ahead of the coming Memorial Day break. Some worry they will face angry constituents who want proof that Democrats are holding Trump accountable while still delivering on promises to create jobs and improve health care.
The tension has created a political headache for people like Cicilline, the head of the Democrats’ messaging team.
“I think delivering on those promises to improve the economic lives of the American people is our first priority,” Cicilline said. “I think Democrats are also united that we need to hold this administration accountable and that we need to demonstrate that no one in this country, including the president, is above the law. While there might be some different ideas about what’s the best vehicle to do that, we are united on those principles.”
Story 1: President Trump Accuses Great Britain of Spying On Him — Videos —
Royal Az – Donald Trump accuses UK of spying on him the day after confirming state visit
Donald Trump and his UK state visit – BBC Newsnight
GCHQ denies wiretapping President Donald Trump
GCHQ blasts Trump’s ‘utterly ridiculous’ accusation that it helped Barack Obama spy on his campaign in 2016 – just a day after the President accepted invitation for UK state visit
Mr Trump highlighted claim by former CIA analyst that GCHQ spied on him
The tweet said: ‘Wow it is now just a question of time before the truth comes out’
GCHQ responded by dismissing the claim it was asked to conduct wiretapping
The row has exploded just a day after it was announced Trump would visit UK
PUBLISHED: 12:50 EDT, 24 April 2019 | UPDATED: 14:01 EDT, 24 April 2019
GCHQ – Britain’s electronic espionage agency – has blasted Donald Trump’s ‘utterly ridiculous’ accusation that it helped Barack Obama spy on his campaign in 2016 – just a day after the president announced his UK state visit.
The US president highlighted a claim by former CIA analyst Larry Johnson that British intelligence assisted the administration of Barack Obama by spying on his 2016 run for the White House.
In a trademark tweet, Mr Trump added: ‘WOW! It is now just a question of time before the truth comes out, and when it does, it will be a beauty!’
However GCHQ responded by referring to a statement it issued when similar allegations surfaced in 2017 dismissing the claim it was asked to conduct ‘wiretapping’ against the then president elect as ‘nonsense’.
‘They are utterly ridiculous and should be ignored,’ the statement said.
The row erupted just a day after it was announced that Mr Trump would be making his long-awaited state visit to the UK in June.
President Donald Trump repeated a claim that United Kingdom’s intelligence service helped former President Barack Obama spy on his 2016 campaign
Johnson worked at the CIA from 1985 to 1989 but is best known for spreading the hoax in 2008 that Michelle Obama had been videotaped using a slur against Caucasians
Downing Street denied that the row risked casting a pall over the visit. Asked if Theresa May feared Mr Trump’s tweet would ‘sour’ his trip to Britain, the Prime Minister’s official spokesman said: ‘No. The US and UK are long-standing partners. We do more together than any two countries in the world.
‘We share intelligence that we do not share with other allies. That unparalleled sharing of intelligence between our countries has undoubtedly saved British lives.
‘A state visit is an opportunity to strengthen our ties.’
The spokesman declined to make any comment on the contents of Mr Trump’s tweet, on the grounds that he never discussed security issues in public. Asked whether GCHQ was speaking on behalf of the Government, he replied: ‘GCHQ is indeed part of the Government.’
In his tweet, Mr Trump referenced a report by the One America News Network which referred to the claims made by Larry Johnson, a former CIA analyst.
Mr Johnson is a controversial figure in the US where he has been accused of making a series of false allegations – including one that Michelle Obama had been recorded using a slur against white people.
The allegation that GCHQ spied on the Trump campaign at the behest of the Obama administration was first made in 2017 by Andrew Napolitano, a former judge and commentator for Fox News.
He claimed he had been told by intelligence sources that the Obama team had wanted to use the British agency so there would be ‘no American fingerprints on this’.
His comments were then picked up by the then-White House press secretary Sean Spicer to back up Mr Trump’s claim that the Obama administration had bugged his phones.
That prompted a rare public denial from GCHQ.
It said in a statement: ‘Recent allegations made by media commentator judge Andrew Napolitano about GCHQ being asked to conduct ‘wiretapping’ against the then president-elect are nonsense.’
Mr Trump’s intervention threatened to lead to new strains in the relationship with the US, just as the two countries are preparing for the president’s state visit in June.
It comes amid signs that ministers are prepared to grant Chinese tech giant Huawei a role in building the UK’s 5G network – something the US strongly opposes.
Ministers denied a decision had been taken to allow it to provide ‘noncore’ equipment at a meeting on Tuesday of the National Security Council chaired by Theresa May, saying a final decision was expected later in the spring.
However, speaking at a cyber security conference in Glasgow, the head of GCHQ Jeremy Fleming said the ‘flag of origin’ was only a ‘secondary factor’ when considering whether to allow particular technology to be used in the UK network.
Senior security figures have previously warned that allowing a Chinese firm access to the UK’s critical telecommunications network could jeopardise national security.
The US has banned Huawei from taking part in its government networks and has been pressing other partners in the Five Eyes intelligence alliance – the UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand – to follow suit.
It reflects fears that the Chinese government could require it to install ‘back door’ technology that would allow it to spy on them or disrupt their communications.
Asked if Prime Minister Theresa May feared Trump’s tweet would ‘sour’ his trip to Britain, the Prime Minister’s official spokesman said: ‘No. The U.S. and UK are long-standing partners. We do more together than any two countries in the world.
‘We share intelligence that we do not share with other allies. That unparalleled sharing of intelligence between our countries has undoubtedly saved British lives.
‘A state visit is an opportunity to strengthen our ties.’
The White House has touted Johnson’s claim before and infuriated the British over it.
In March 2017 Fox News analyst Andrew Napolitano charged the U.K. with spying on Trump – an accusation the White House seized upon and repeated.
Napolitano claimed GCHQ, whose full name is the Government Communications Headquarters, wiretapped Trump’s campaign on behalf of Obama.
Then-White House press secretary Sean Spicer repeated the charge from the podium during one of his briefings, drawing outrage from the British.
A spokesperson for the British intelligence agency called the claims ‘utterly ridiculous.’
‘They are utterly ridiculous and should be ignored,’ the spokesperson said in a rare statement on intelligence activities.
The president was asked about it during a March 17, 2017 press conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
‘We said nothing. All we did was quote a certain very talented legal mind who was the one responsible for saying that on television, I didn’t make an opinion on it. You shouldn’t be talking to me. You should be talking to Fox,’ he said at the time.
Shortly after Trump’s statement, Fox News disavowed Napolitano’s claim on the air.
‘Fox News cannot confirm Judge Napolitano’s commentary,’ anchor Shepard Smith said. ‘Fox News knows of no evidence of any kind that the now-president of the United States was surveilled at any time, any way. Full stop.’
Former CIA analyst Larry Johnson has long claimed the British helped Obama’s administration help spy on Trump – a charge the United Kingdom has denied
In March 2017 Fox News analyst Andrew Napolitano charged the U.K. with spying on Trump – claim he made using Johnson as a source
2017: ‘Something in common’ Trump makes wiretap joke to Merkel
The American and British governments have an agreement not to spy on each other as members of the ‘Five Eyes.’
The U.S., U.K., Australia, New Zealand and Canada are all members of the group. The five countries share intelligence information and agree not to spy against one another.
Johnson admitted he was one of Napolitano’s sources on the matter.
He told Politico at the time that his source on the spying claim was someone ‘with a history of having access to national security information.’
Johnson worked at the CIA from 1985 to 1989 but is best known for spreading the hoax in 2008 that Michelle Obama had been videotaped using a slur against Caucasians.
He claimed she ‘railing against whitey’ at a church.
Johnson said he had not seen the tape himself but heard from sources Republicans had the tape ‘to drop at the appropriate time.’
No such tape was ever released.
Then White House press secretary Sean Spicer repeated the charge from the podium, infuriating the British
President Trump was asked about the matter in his March 2017 press conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel
He’s also a defender of Russia and frequently appears on Russian state TV.
‘I’m not a nut,’ he told Politico. ‘I call things as I see it. I don’t pander to any one particular political position.’
Trump, meanwhile, has been ramping claims his campaign was spied up since word came special counsel Robert Mueller was wrapping up his investigation and about to deliver his report.
The president seized upon a claim made by Attorney General William Barr – in an early April hearing before Mueller’s report came out – that there was U.S. spying against Trump’s campaign and he was assembling a team to review investigative conduct during the elections.
‘I think spying did occur,’ Barr said at a Senate hearing.
‘I think what he said was absolutely true. There was absolutely spying into my campaign,’ Trump said after Barr’s testimony. ‘I’ll go a step further. It was my opinion it was illegal spying, unprecedented spying, and something that should never be allowed to happen in our country again.’
Donald Trump accuses Britain of SPYING on him as he ramps up tensions ahead of showdown UK visit
US President made the sensational claim in a tweet quoting a conspiracy website
By Corey Charlton
24th April 2019, 3:45 pm
Updated: 24th April 2019, 6:13 pm
DONALD Trump has accused the UK of helping the Obama administration SPY on him during the 2016 presidential campaign.
The US President made the sensational claim in a tweet today, quoting the right-wing conspiracy-peddling website One America News Network.
REUTERS
Donald Trump has rehashed discredited allegations he was spied on by Britain
He made the allegation in this tweet today, citing the partisan right-wing website One America News
It cited a former CIA analyst who accused UK agencies of helping the Obama Administration spy on Trump election campaign.
The president added: “WOW! It is now just a question of time before the truth comes out, and when it does, it will be a beauty!”
The bizarre accusation comes just days after it was revealed Trump would be undertaking a state visit this summer.
It may be he is hoping to ramp up tensions ahead of the visit in a bid to improve his leverage in any political discussions which may take place.
However, the accusation actually dates back to at least 2017 and has been denied by both the Obama administration and MI6.
A British security official was quoted by Reuters as saying the accusation was “totally untrue and quite frankly, absurd.”
STATE VISIT
Meanwhile, Donald and Melania will not stay at Buckingham Palace during their state visit this summer because the Queen has got the builders in, it’s been claimed.
Buckingham Palace revealed that the Trumps will visit the UK for three days from June 3rd to the 5th which is timed to coincide with the 75th anniversary of D-Day.
It comes more than two years after Theresa May first offered the visit when they met in January 2017 at the White House.
However, any hopes of the Republican leader staying over at the Palace have been scuppered.
Sources said the Trumps would have been expected to stay in the palace’s historic Belgian Suite which is still open.
However, it’s reported none of their entourage of aides or staff could be accommodated due to the closure of the East Wing.
The Daily Mail reports there is no suggestion the couple will be offered other royal accommodation which means they will most likely take up residence at Winfield House.
The manor house – which is the palatial London home of the US Ambassador – is where they stayed last summer.
However, royal aides insisted there was no snub intended to the President and First Lady pointing out even the Queen may be forced to leave her official London home during the renovation.
Story 2: President Trump Goes On Offense With Washington Establishment — Hit Me With Your Best Shot — They Did — Trump Won — It’s Over — Go Pound Sand — Videos —
Trump says subpoenas issued by Democrats a tactic to win 2020
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Trump says he’s against aides testifying to Congress about Mueller report
Lindsey Graham expects a ‘stampede’ to impeach Trump
Mission accomplished: Did Russian election interference degrade the political process in America?
Tucker: Democrats struggle to let go of collusion hoax
Tucker: Dem candidates are sabotaging their own chances
The Mueller Report – A PBS NewsHour/FRONTLINE Special
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Pound sand Meaning
White House plans to fight House subpoena of former counsel Donald McGahn for testimony on Mueller report
Josh Dawsey, Robert Costa, Rosalind Helderman
The White House plans to fight a subpoena issued by the House Judiciary Committee for former White House counsel Donald McGahn to testify, according to people familiar with the matter, setting up another showdown in the aftermath of the special counsel report.
The Trump administration also plans to oppose other requests from House committees for the testimony of current and former aides about actions in the White House described in special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s report, according to two people familiar with internal thinking who, like others interviewed for this story, spoke of the plans on the condition of anonymity.
White House lawyers plan to tell attorneys for administration witnesses called by the House that they will be asserting executive privilege over their testimony, officials said.
Such a move will intensify a power struggle between the Trump administration and congressional Democrats, potentially setting up a protracted court battle.
McGahn was mentioned more than 150 times in Mueller’s report and told investigators about how the president pressured him to oust the special counsel and then pushed him to publicly deny the episode.
McGahn’s lawyer, William Burck, began discussions with the Judiciary Committee about his potential testimony after the panel issued a subpoena Monday, according to people familiar with the matter.
Securing McGahn’s testimony would be a boon for the committee, which hopes to focus on potential obstruction of justice by Trump in a series of public hearings this spring while exploring other “abuses of power,” Democratic aides said.
Public testimony from McGahn could create a spectacle that would parallel the June 1973 testimony of President Richard Nixon’s former White House counsel, John Dean, whose live televised appearance before a Senate committee painted a vivid portrait for the country of the White House coverup of the Watergate burglary.
People close to McGahn, who were not authorized to speak publicly, said McGahn is “following the process” and working with the White House on his next steps, despite Trump’s public and private anger about his former counsel’s prominence in the Mueller report.
“He’s not eager to testify. He’s not reluctant. He got a subpoena. It compels him to testify. But there are some countervailing legal reasons that might prevent that,” said one person close to McGahn, who described private discussions on the condition of anonymity. “He doesn’t want to be in contempt of Congress; nor does he want to be in contempt of his ethical obligations and legal obligations as a former White House official.”
Trump has told advisers that McGahn was disloyal to him, and he criticized the lawyer for taking extensive notes of meetings that were cited in Mueller’s report. While initially portraying the report as an exoneration, Trump has grown frustrated with its depiction of his White House.
The two men had an adversarial relationship, with McGahn contemplating quitting several times during his tenure. But he was also key to some of the president’s main accomplishments, like the confirmation of two Supreme Court judges and a record number of federal judiciary appointments.
President Trump’s administration foreshadowed weeks, if not months, of trench warfare with Congress on Tuesday as it defied demands for documents and testimony on multiple fronts in an effort to thwart expanding investigations mounted by House Democrats.
While Democrats debated the merits of pursuing impeachment against Mr. Trump, his advisers signaled that the administration would resist efforts to obtain the president’s tax returns and force his former aides to testify. The refusals could lead to constitutional clashes in court as Mr. Trump seeks to stave off further inquiries into his personal and political matters.
White House lawyers indicated that they planned to tell Donald F. McGahn II, the former White House counsel, and other former officials not to comply with subpoenas for their testimony, according to a person familiar with the legal strategy. The White House also blocked a former official from answering questions about security clearances to officials including Jared Kushner. And the Treasury Department refused to turn over Mr. Trump’s tax returns before a deadline set by House Democrats.
“I agree with the strategy of now fighting everything, the way Clinton did initially,” said Rudolph W. Giuliani, Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer, referring to President Bill Clinton’s approach to investigations in the 1990s. “We already gave every document we have, every witness we have. I don’t think the White House should sit by and have them do it all over again.”
Mr. Giuliani said that Democratic committee chairmen like Representatives Jerrold Nadler of New York and Adam B. Schiff of California had proved to be partisan warriors who had compromised themselves. “They can’t pretend to be objective observers,” he said. “Not Nadler, not Schiff. They’ve expressed too many opinions, and too much of a prejudgment.”
The latest flurry of action came a day after Mr. Trump and his businesses sued the Democratic chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Reform in an effort to quash a congressional subpoena for financial records. Mr. Trump also sought a court order blocking his accounting company from handing over information to the committee.
“It appears that the president believes that the Constitution does not apply to his White House, that he may order officials at will to violate their legal obligations, and that he may obstruct attempts by Congress to conduct oversight,” the chairman, Representative Elijah E. Cummings of Maryland, said on Tuesday after the security officer failed to appear as ordered.
The crossfire on Tuesday reinforced that the investigative battles that have dominated Mr. Trump’s presidency were hardly ended by the report by the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, released last week.
Although Mr. Mueller effectively lifted the greatest threat by saying that he did not establish any criminal conspiracy between Mr. Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and Russian agents seeking to help elect him, the report included enough other damning material that Democratic lawmakers are intent on pursuing their inquiries.
Mr. Trump’s White House and campaign ultimately handed nearly 1.5 million pages of documents to Mr. Mueller and did not assert executive privilege to block aides from testifying, although the president himself refused to be interviewed in person and answered questions only in writing. But Mr. Trump has decided to take a more confrontational approach with Congress on the grounds that its investigations are merely political exercises.
“There is no reason to go any further, and especially in Congress where it’s very partisan — obviously very partisan,” Mr. Trump told The Washington Post in an interview on Tuesday, saying that he opposed current or former White House aides providing testimony to congressional panels.
Although Mr. Trump said no “final, final decision” had been made, the White House planned to tell Mr. McGahn and any other former aides called by lawmakers that it would most likely assert executive privilege, according to the person familiar with the White House strategy, confirming a report in The Post. Mr. Nadler, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, said such an action would “represent one more act of obstruction by an administration desperate to prevent the public from talking about the president’s behavior.”
Mr. McGahn was at the center of repeated acts by Mr. Trump that seemed aimed at impeding investigators, including an episode in June 2017 when the lawyer said the president ordered him to have Mr. Mueller fired. Mr. McGahn almost resigned rather than comply before the situation was defused.
As Mr. Trump made clear his intention to fight, Democrats debated how far to go in pursuing him. Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California, who has cautioned her party against rushing to impeachment, said on Tuesday that Mr. Trump had “engaged in behavior that was unethical, unscrupulous and beneath the dignity of the office that he holds.”
At a forum hosted by Time magazine, she warned that impeachment was “one of the most divisive paths we could go down in our country, but if the path of fact-finding takes us there, we have no choice.”
“We’re not there yet,” she added.
The battlefields on which Mr. Trump and Democrats are fighting are numerous. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told House lawmakers late Tuesday that he would not turn over Mr. Trump’s tax returns by their deadline for the second time but instead needed until May 6 to consult with the Justice Department.
In a letter to Richard E. Neal, the Democratic chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, Mr. Mnuchin said that the Treasury Department “cannot act upon your request unless and until it is determined to be consistent with law.”
Mr. Neal requested six years’ worth of the president’s personal and business tax returns. Mr. Mnuchin expressed concern that the request was being made for political purposes and was a violation of taxpayer privacy that could lead to the Internal Revenue Service being weaponized against both parties in the future.
In Tuesday’s letter, Mr. Mnuchin appeared to lay the groundwork to deny the request, listing several “legal concerns,” including “constitutional limits” on gaining access to tax returns and the “asserted purpose” for seeking the records.
Mr. Neal issued a terse statement but did not indicate his next move. “I plan to consult with counsel about my next steps,” he said.
Mr. Neal has largely dismissed Mr. Mnuchin’s arguments, saying that they lacked merit, and has said that failing to hand over the returns by Tuesday would be “interpreted as a denial of my request.”
In his letter, Mr. Mnuchin said that the delay was not a failure to comply with the request and that portraying it as such would be “a misinterpretation.”
“The committee’s request has not been denied or granted at this time,” he said.
The White House also directed its former head of personnel security, Carl Kline, to defy a subpoena ordering him to appear on Tuesday for a deposition by a House committee looking into security clearances. Mr. Cummings, that committee’s chairman, said he would discuss scheduling a contempt vote against Mr. Kline for failing to appear.
Democrats want to talk to Mr. Kline about how Mr. Kushner, Mr. Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser, obtained his security clearance despite concerns raised by career security officials about possible foreign influence.
The White House instructed Mr. Kline not to comply on the grounds that the committee would not allow a White House representative to attend the deposition. Michael M. Purpura, a deputy White House counsel, said in a letter to Mr. Kline’s lawyer, Robert N. Driscoll, that the White House wanted to ensure that questioning “was limited to the proper scope” and that Mr. Kline not be pressed into revealing information that could be covered by executive privilege.
The White House did not assert executive privilege in instructing Mr. Kline not to appear, but Mr. Cummings said the action amounted to stonewalling. “There are obvious reasons we need to conduct our investigations of agency malfeasance with representatives of the office under investigation,” Mr. Cummings said.
In an email to Mr. Cummings on Monday, Mr. Driscoll said Mr. Kline, who now works for the Defense Department, had been trapped between two legal prerogatives.
“With two masters from two equal branches of government,” Mr. Driscoll wrote, “we will follow the instructions of the one that employs him.”
Social Security Combined Trust Funds Gain One Year Says Board of Trustees Disability Fund Shows Strong Improvement—Twenty Years
The Social Security Board of Trustees today released its annual report on the long-term financial status of the Social Security Trust Funds. The combined asset reserves of the Old-Age and Survivors Insurance and Disability Insurance (OASI and DI) Trust Funds are projected to become depleted in 2035, one year later than projected last year, with 80 percent of benefits payable at that time.
The OASI Trust Fund is projected to become depleted in 2034, the same as last year’s estimate, with 77 percent of benefits payable at that time. The DI Trust Fund is estimated to become depleted in 2052, extended 20 years from last year’s estimate of 2032, with 91 percent of benefits still payable.
In the 2019 Annual Report to Congress, the Trustees announced:
The asset reserves of the combined OASI and DI Trust Funds increased by $3 billion in 2018 to a total of $2.895 trillion.
The total annual cost of the program is projected to exceed total annual income, for the first time since 1982, in 2020 and remain higher throughout the 75-year projection period. As a result, asset reserves are expected to decline during 2020. Social Security’s cost has exceeded its non-interest income since 2010.
The year when the combined trust fund reserves are projected to become depleted, if Congress does not act before then, is 2035 – gaining one year from last year’s projection. At that time, there would be sufficient income coming in to pay 80 percent of scheduled benefits.
“The Trustees recommend that lawmakers address the projected trust fund shortfalls in a timely way in order to phase in necessary changes gradually and give workers and beneficiaries time to adjust to them,” said Nancy A. Berryhill, Acting Commissioner of Social Security. “The large change in the reserve depletion date for the DI Fund is mainly due to continuing favorable trends in the disability program. Disability applications have been declining since 2010, and the number of disabled-worker beneficiaries receiving payments has been falling since 2014.”
Other highlights of the Trustees Report include:
Total income, including interest, to the combined OASI and DI Trust Funds amounted to just over $1 trillion in 2018. ($885 billion from net payroll tax contributions, $35 billion from taxation of benefits, and $83 billion in interest)
Total expenditures from the combined OASI and DI Trust Funds amounted to $1 trillion in 2018.
Social Security paid benefits of nearly $989 billion in calendar year 2018. There were about 63 million beneficiaries at the end of the calendar year.
The projected actuarial deficit over the 75-year long-range period is 2.78 percent of taxable payroll – lower than the 2.84 percent projected in last year’s report.
During 2018, an estimated 176 million people had earnings covered by Social Security and paid payroll taxes.
The cost of $6.7 billion to administer the Social Security program in 2018 was a very low 0.7 percent of total expenditures.
The combined Trust Fund asset reserves earned interest at an effective annual rate of 2.9 percent in 2018.
The Board of Trustees usually comprises six members. Four serve by virtue of their positions with the federal government: Steven T. Mnuchin, Secretary of the Treasury and Managing Trustee; Nancy A. Berryhill, Acting Commissioner of Social Security; Alex M. Azar II, Secretary of Health and Human Services; and R. Alexander Acosta, Secretary of Labor. The two public trustee positions are currently vacant.
The annual report of the Social Security Board of Trustees presents the actuarial status of the Old-Ageand Survivors Insurance (OASI) and Disability Insurance (DI) Trust Funds. The table below outlines key measures of the actuarial status of the trust funds under the intermediate assumptions in the 2019 report.
The outlook for the combined OASDI trust funds is slightly improved from the 2018 report. The projected actuarial deficit for the combined trust funds over the next 75 years is 2.78 percent of taxable payroll, 0.06 percentage point lower than last year. As a share of the economy as measured by gross domestic product (GDP), the actuarial deficit over the next 75 years is projected to be 1.0 percent.
Depletion of the DI Trust Fund asset reserves is now projected for 2052, 20 years later than in last year’s report. Disabled-worker applications have continued to decline since 2010 and disability incidence rates have been well below expectations. Based on sustained lower incidence rates, the Trustees have reduced the long-range disability incidence rate assumption for this report.
The OASI Trust Fund alone can pay full benefits until 2034, the same as projected last year, and the combined OASDI funds until 2035, one year later than in last year’s report.
Comparison: Key Measures of Actuarial Status in the Social Security Trustees Reports
2018 report
2019 report
75-year actuarial deficit
As a percentage of taxable payroll
2.84%
2.78%
As a percentage of GDP
1.0%
1.0%
Income and outgo in year prior to report year (in billions)
Income
Total
$997
$1,003
Social Security contributions a
$874
$885
Income taxes on benefits
$38
$35
Interest
$85
$83
Outgo
Total
$952
$1,000
Benefit payments b
$946
$994
Administration
$6
$7
Net increase in assets
$44
$3
Trust fund reserves
Amount at beginning of report year (in billions)
$2,892
$2,895
Amount at beginning of report year (as a percentage of report year outgo)
288%
273%
Year of peak trust fund reserves c
2018
2019
Amount at end of peak year (in billions)
$2,890
$2,896
Year of trust fund depletion
OASDI
2034
2035
OASI
2034
2034
DI
2032
2052
Share of OASDI outgo covered by scheduled revenue in—
Year of trust fund depletion
79%
80%
End of 75-year reporting period
74%
75%
SOURCES: 2018 and 2019 Trustees Reports.
a. Includes a small amount of reimbursements from the General Fund of the Treasury due to the payroll contribution holiday.
b. Includes a small amount of payments to the Railroad Retirement Board.
c. Measured at end of year.
A 2018 annual surplus of $3.1 billion increased the asset reserves of the combined OASDI trust funds, bringing the total reserves to $2.89 trillion at the end of the year. This amount is equal to 273 percent of the estimated annual expenditures for 2019. The 2018 Trustees Report had projected a $1.7 billion decrease in combined trust fund reserves during 2018 under the intermediate assumptions. The $4.9 billion difference is mainly attributable to underestimating OASI program income (by $2.9 billion) and overestimating DI program cost (by $2.5 billion).
The Trustees now project that OASDI annual cost will exceed total income beginning in 2020—two years later than projected in last year’s report—and continuing throughout the projection period. After the projected trust fund reserve depletion in 2035, continuing income would be sufficient to pay 80 percent of program cost, declining to 75 percent for 2093.
Beneficiaries and Benefit Payments
At the end of 2018, the Social Security program was providing monthly benefits to about 63 million people: 53 million from the OASI Trust Fund and 10 million from the DI Trust Fund. Total benefit payments for the year (excluding payments to the Railroad Retirement Board) were $989 billion: $845 billion from the OASI Trust Fund and $144 billion from the DI Trust Fund.
Sources of Trust Fund Income
During 2018, an estimated 176 million workers had earnings covered by Social Security and paid payroll taxes. Employees pay a 6.2 percent contribution from earnings up to a maximum of $132,900 in 2019, which their employers match. Self-employed workers pay both shares of the contribution, or 12.4 percent. More than 40 percent of current beneficiaries pay income taxes on part of their benefits, and those taxes go to the OASDI trust funds and Medicare’s Hospital Insurance Trust Fund. The trust funds also earn interest ($83 billion in 2018 for the combined OASDI trust funds) on their accumulated reserves.
The Pronk Pops blog is the broadcasting and mass communication of ideas about life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, prosperity, truth, virtue and wisdom.
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The Pronk Pops Show 1346, October 28, 2019, Story 1: United States Military Special Operators Force Suicide of ISIS Leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi — Videos — Story 2: Democrats Still Pushing Impeachment Despite No Evidence of High Crimes and Misdemeanors — Videos — Story 3: Joe Biden The Marathon Man For President — Videos
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Story 1: United States Military Special Operators Force Suicide of ISIS Leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi — Videos ––
President Trump Announces ISIS Leader Killed in US Military Raid
President Donald Trump announces the death of Islamic State Leader al-Baghdadi
Trump confirms death of ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi
Mike Pompeo goes inside the mission that killed al-Baghdadi
‘It was a brilliantly executed operation’: Defense secretary on al-Baghdadi raid | ABC News
‘He died like a dog’ Trump addresses the nation and says ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi died ‘whimpering and crying and screaming’
By KATELYN CARALLE, U.S. POLITICAL REPORTER FOR DAILYMAIL.COM
PUBLISHED: 09:30 EDT, 27 October 2019 | UPDATED: 10:49 EDT, 28 October 2019
Donald Trump announced Sunday morning that ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi ‘died like a dog’ as the result of a U.S. Special Ops forces raid on his hideout in northwest Syria.
‘Last night the United State brought the world’s number one terrorist leader to justice. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is dead,’ Trump said from the Diplomatic Reception Room, where just a week earlier he announced a ceasefire between Turkey and the Kurds.
‘He was the founder and leader of ISIS, the most ruthless and violent terror organization anywhere in the world,’ he continued as he described the events of the raid.
Al-Baghdadi, the president confirmed, detonated his suicide vest, killing himself and three children, during an overnight targeted attack in Syria’s Idlib province.
The president touted the operation and al-Baghdadi’s death as ‘bigger than bin Laden.’ Osama bin Laden, founder of Al-Qaeda and the terrorist leader behind the September 11 terrorist attacks, was killed in 2011 during a Navy SEALs operation during Barack Obama’s presidency.
‘This is the biggest there is. This is the worst ever. Osama bin Laden was big, but Osama bin Laden became big with the World Trade Center. This is a man who built a whole, as he would like to call it, a country,’ Trump said, referencing al-Baghdadi’s creation of the Islamic State.
Donald Trump addressed the nation Sunday morning, confirming that the death of ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. He said he had watched and monitored the whole operation Saturday night
Meeting in the situation room Saturday night (from left to right): National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien, Vice President Mike Pence, Trump, Secretary of Defense Mark Esper and Joint Chiefs of Staff U.S. Army General Mark Milley and Brig. General Marcus Evans
Trump also referred to al-Baghdadi and those who followed him as ‘losers,’ and lauded that no U.S. personnel were lost during the raid. He did say, however, that one ‘talented canine’ was injured.
‘I got to watch much of it. No personnel were lost in the operation, while a large number of Baghdadi’s fighters and companions were killed with him,’ Trump said during his rare Sunday morning remarks.
‘He died after running into a dead-end tunnel, whimpering and crying and screaming all the way,’ Trump continued, adding that Baghdadi drug three of his children with him. ‘They were led to certain death.’
‘He reached the end of the tunnel as our dogs chased him down. He ignited his vest, killing himself and the three children. His body was mutilated by the blast. the tunnel had caved in on it, in addition. But test results gave certain, immediate and totally positive identification. It was him. The thug who tried so hard to intimidate others spent his last moments in utter fear, in total panic and dread, terrified of the American forces bearing down on him,’ he detailed.
he White House confirmed that Trump watched and listened to the operations unfold in the Situation room Saturday night – Sunday morning Syria time – with National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien, Vice President Mike Pence, Secretary of Defense Mark Esper and Joint Chiefs of Staff U.S. Army General Mark Milley and Brig. General Marcus Evans.
The president said, while claiming he’s been looking for Baghdadi ever since assuming office, that he’s potentially the only one better at ‘using the internet’ than ISIS forces.
‘A couple of weeks ago they were able to scope him out,’ Trump said of the U.S. intelligence community.
‘You know, these people are very smart, they are not into the use of cell phones any more. They’re very technically brilliant,’ the president said in reference to those working for ISIS.
‘You know, they use the internet better than almost anybody in the world, perhaps other than Donald Trump,’ he continued. ‘But they use the internet incredibly well and what they’ve done with the internet through recruiting and everything – and that is why he died like a dog, he died like a coward. He was whimpering, screaming and crying, and frankly I think it’s something that should be brought out so that his followers and all of these young kids that want to leave various countries – including the United States – they should see how he died. He didn’t die a hero, he died a coward – crying, whimpering, and screaming and bringing three kids with him to die. Certain death.’
The president teased Saturday night, ‘Something very big has just happened!’ and the White House also announced that night that the president would be ‘making a major statement’ Sunday morning from the White House.
Trump said he does not regret his decision to withdraw U.S. troops from northern Syria, which opened the way for Turkey to invade and target Kurdish forces.
Caliphate leader: Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi detonated his own suicide vest during the targeted raid on his lair in Syria’s Idlib province and killed three of his children in the blast. He is shown in a still from a video released in April, having not been seen since he spoke at the Grand Mosque in Mosul in 2014
Syrians ride a motorcycle past a burnt vehicle near the site where a helicopter gunfire reportedly killed nine people near the northwestern Syrian village of Barisha
Al-Baghdadi arrived at the area of the raid 48 hours beforehand, Turkish officials said – and the CIA assisted in locating him.
Information is now emerging over how the U.S. was able to track down Baghdadi, including details of his whereabouts from two inside informants.
A senior Iraqi intelligence official told the Associated Press that a few months ago an Iraqi aide to al-Baghdadi was killed in western Iraq by a U.S. airstrike, and his wife was arrested and handed over to Iraqi authorities.
The official indicated that the wife ended up being a key source of information on al-Baghdadi’s whereabouts. The Iraqis who had her in custody were ultimately able to pass along to the U.S. coordinates on al-Baghdadi through information they learned from the aide’s wife.
A second Iraqi security official said al-Baghdadi’s brother-in-law was recently arrested by the Iraqis and also gave information on Baghdadi’s whereabouts
The ISIS leader’s two wives, who were both wearing explosive devices that never detonated, were taken down. Several of his children were taken from the lair and are still alive. Several others were killed in the attack.
Trump said more people were killed than captured, but confirmed there are some in U.S. custody.
Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) confirmed on Sunday they had worked with the U.S. on a ‘successful’ operation against Islamic State.
‘Our strong and effective operations once again confirm our strength and determination to go after (Islamic State),’ the head of the SDF’s media office said.
The Syrian Democratic Forces is an alliance in the Syrian Civil War made up of primarily Kurdish, Arab and Assyrian/Syriac militias.
SDF General Commander Mazloum Abdi took partial credit for taking down al-Baghdadi, but also thanked the president and U.S. Army in its efforts, which he said have been under way for almost half-a-year.
‘For five months there has been joint intel cooperation on the ground and accurate monitoring, until we achieved a joint operation to kill Abu Bakir al-Baghdadi. Thanks to everybody who participate in this great mission,’ Abdi tweeted, tagging Donald Trump’s Twitter account.
Al-Baghdadi, the leader of the so-called Islamic caliphate, blew himself up during the targeted attack on his lair in Syria’s Idlib province in the early hours of Sunday morning. His lair was in a village known for smuggling, and he arrived there 48 hours before the raid
The ISIS leader has been among U.S. and Europe’s force’s most wanted figures since his chilling call to arms in 2014, which saw a shift away from the mass casualty attacks carried out by al-Qaeda in favor of smaller-scale acts of violence.
Shifting away from the airline hijackings and other mass-casualty attacks that came to define al-Qaeda, al-Baghdadi encouraged smaller-scale acts of violence that would be harder for law enforcement to prepare for and prevent.
He encouraged jihadists who could not travel to the caliphate to instead kill where they were using whatever weapon they had at their disposal, resulting in a series of devastating attacks in the UK and Europe.
His words inspired more than 140 terrorist attacks in 29 countries other than Iraq and Syria, resulting in the deaths of at least 2,043 people, CNN reports.
Since 2016, the State Department has offered a reward of up to $25 million for information or intelligence that could lead to Baghdadi’s capture or death.
Al-Baghdadi led ISIS for the last five years, presiding over its ascendancy as it cultivated a barbaric reputation for beheadings and horrific executions.
These recordings, often noted for their high production values, were distributed online along with the ISIS propaganda magazine Dabiq.
He remained among the few ISIS commanders still at large despite multiple claims in recent years about his death and even as his so-called caliphate dramatically shrank, with many supporters who joined the cause either imprisoned or jailed.
A picture taken on October 27, 2019 shows a burnt vehicle at the site where a helicopter gunfire killed nine people near the northwestern Syrian village of Barisha in the province of Idlib near the border with Turkey
Trump teased, without explanation on Saturday that ‘Something very big has just happened!’ and the White House confirmed the president would be addressing the nation on Sunday morning
With a £19.5 million ($25m) bounty on his head, al-Baghdadi had been far less visible in recent years, releasing only sporadic audio recordings, including one just last month in which he called on members of the extremist group to do all they could to free ISIS detainees and women held in jails and camps.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported an attack carried out by a squadron of eight helicopters accompanied by a warplane.
The attacks were on positions where ISIS operatives were believed to be hiding in the Barisha area north of Idlib city, after midnight on Saturday-Sunday.
It said the helicopters targeted ISIS positions with heavy strikes for about 120 minutes, during which jihadists targeted the helicopters with heavy weapons.
The Syrian Observatory documented the death of nine people as a result of the coalition helicopter attack, adding that the death toll is likely to rise due to the presence of a large number of wounded.
The strike came amid concerns that a recent American pullback from northeastern Syria could infuse new strength into the militant group, which had lost vast stretches of territory it had once controlled.
The purported audio was his first public statement since last April, when he appeared in a video for the first time in five years.
Reports suggest that al-Baghdadi, the elusive militant who has been the subject of an international manhunt for years, had been killed in Idlib, Syria
In 2014, he was a black-robed figure delivering a sermon from the pulpit of Mosul’s Great Mosque of al-Nuri, his only known public appearance.
He urged Muslims around the world to swear allegiance to the caliphate and obey him as its leader.
‘It is a burden to accept this responsibility to be in charge of you,’ he said in the video.
‘I am not better than you or more virtuous than you. If you see me on the right path, help me. If you see me on the wrong path, advise me and halt me. And obey me as far as I obey God.’
The death of such a high-value U.S. target comes amid a difficult political backdrop for Trump, who has been frustrated heavy media focus on the Democratic-led impeachment inquiry, which he calls a bipartisan smear.
He has also faced withering criticism from both Republicans and Democrats alike for his U.S. troop withdrawal from northeastern Syria, which permitted Turkey to attack America’s Kurdish allies.
The rise and fall of the Islamic State
The Islamic State group erupted from the chaos of Syria and Iraq’s conflicts, declaring itself a ‘caliphate’ after conquering a giant stretch of territory.
Its territorial rule, which at its height in 2014 stretched across nearly a third of both Syria and Iraq, ended in March with a last stand by several hundred of its militants at a tiny Syrian village on the banks of the Euphrates near the border with Iraq.
But the militants have maintained a presence in both countries, and their shadowy leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi had continued releasing messages urging them to keep up the fight.
Here are the key moments in the rise and fall of the Islamic State group:
April 2013 – Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi announces the merger of his group with al-Qaeda’s franchise in Syria, forming the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant.
January 2014 – Al-Baghdadi’s forces overrun the city of Fallujah in Iraq’s western Anbar province and parts of the nearby provincial capital of Ramadi. In Syria, they seize sole control of the city of Raqqa after driving out rival Syrian rebel factions, and it becomes their de facto capital.
February 2014 – Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahri disavows al-Baghdadi after the Iraqi militant ignores his demands that IS leave Syria.
June 2014 – IS captures Mosul, Iraq’s second-largest city, and pushes south as Iraqi forces crumble, eventually capturing Saddam Hussein’s hometown of Tikrit and reaching the outskirts of Baghdad. When they threaten Shiite holy sites, Iraq’s top Shiite cleric issues a call to arms, and masses of volunteers, largely backed and armed by Iran, join militias.
June 29, 2014 – The group renames itself the Islamic State and declares the establishment of a self-styled ‘caliphate’ in its territories in Iraq and Syria. Al-Baghdadi is declared the caliph.
July 4, 2014 – Al-Baghdadi makes his first public appearance, delivering a Friday sermon in Mosul’s historic al-Nuri Mosque. He urges Muslims around the world to swear allegiance to the caliphate and obey him as its leader.
August 2014 – IS captures the town of Sinjar west of Mosul and begins a systematic slaughter of the tiny Yazidi religious community. Women and girls are kidnapped as sex slaves; hundreds remain missing to this day.
August 8, 2014 – The U.S. launches its campaign of airstrikes against IS in Iraq.
September 22, 2014 – The U.S.-led coalition begins an aerial campaign against IS in Syria.
January, 2015 – Iraqi Kurdish fighters, backed by U.S.-led airstrikes, drive IS out of several towns north of Mosul. In Syria, Kurdish fighters backed by U.S. airstrikes repel an IS onslaught on the town of Kobani on the border with Turkey, the first significant defeat for IS.
April 1, 2015 – U.S.-backed Iraqi forces retake Tikrit, their first major victory against IS.
May 20, 2015 – IS captures the ancient Syrian town of Palmyra, where the extremists later destroy archaeological treasures.
February 9, 2016 – Iraqi forces recapture Ramadi after months of fighting and at enormous cost, with thousands of buildings destroyed. Almost the entire population fled the city.
June 26, 2016 – Fallujah is declared liberated by Iraqi forces after a five-week battle.
July 3, 2016 – IS sets off a gigantic suicide truck bomb outside a Baghdad shopping mall, killing almost 300 people, the deadliest attack in Iraq since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.
October 17, 2016 – Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi announces the start of the operation to liberate Mosul.
Iraqi Army soldiers celebrate as they hold an IS flag, which they captured during a raid on a village outside Mosul in November 2016
November 5, 2016 – The U.S.-backed, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces launch Operation Euphrates Wrath, the first of five operations aiming to retake Raqqa, starting with an encircling of the city.
January 24, 2017 – Al-Abadi announces eastern Mosul has been ‘fully liberated’.
May 10, 2017 – SDF captures the strategic Tabqa dam after weeks of battles and a major airlift operation that brought SDF fighters and their U.S. advisers to the area. The fall of the dam facilitated the push on Raqqa, about 25 miles away.
June 6, 2017 – SDF fighters begin an attack on Raqqa from three sides, backed by U.S.-led coalition airstrikes.
June 18, 2017 – Iraqi forces launch battle for Mosul’s Old City, the last IS stronghold there.
June 21, 2017 – IS destroys Mosul’s iconic al-Nuri Mosque and its 12th century leaning minaret as Iraqi forces close in.
July 10, 2017 – Iraqi PM declares victory over IS in Mosul and end of the extremists’ caliphate in Iraq.
October 17, 2017 – SDF takes full control of Raqqa after months of heavy bombardment that devastates the city.
September – December, 2017 – Syrian government forces, backed by Russian air power and Iranian forces, recapture IS territory on the western bank of the Euphrates River, seizing the cities of Deir el-Zour, Mayadin and Boukamal on the border with Iraq.
Isis lost its hold over Mosul in July 2017 but the city suffered severe bombing
August 23, 2018 – IS leader al-Baghdadi resurfaces in his first purported audio recording in almost a year; he urges followers to ‘persevere’ and continue fighting.
September 10, 2018 – SDF launches a ground offensive, backed by U.S.-led coalition airstrikes, to take the last territory held by IS in Syria’s eastern province of Deir el-Zour.
March 23, 2019 – SDF declares the complete capture of Baghouz and the end of the Islamic State group’s territorial ‘caliphate’.
October 27, 2019 – President Donald Trump announced that al-Baghdadi was killed during a US. Special Ops forces raid on his hideout in northwest Syria. Trump said the ‘violent terror leader’ died after running into a dead-end tunnel, and detonating his suicide vest, killing himself and three of his children.
– Source: Associated Press
Story 2: Delusional Democrats Still Pushing Impeachment Despite No Evidence of High Crimes and Misdemeanors — Videos —
Varney: Dems still pushing impeachment despite al-Baghdadi triumph
Trump blasts Adam Schiff: ‘He’s a corrupt politician’
Trump calls impeachment inquiry a ‘lynching’
Story 3: Joe Biden The Marathon Man For President — Videos
JOE BIDEN LEAD IS FADING: Could Pete Buttigieg Win the 2020 Democratic Nomination?
Joe Biden slips in latest New Hampshire poll
Biden unconcerned about Warren’s rise
Behind Biden’s bounce back
Joe Biden in Danger of Humiliating Loss in Iowa, Top Democrats Warn
2020 Daily Trail Markers: Biden campaigns in Iowa as others rise in polling
Elizabeth Warren, Joe Biden In Statistical Dead Heat In Iowa: Poll | Morning Joe | MSNBC
Joe Biden Adds To Lead And Warren Surges In New NBC Poll Of 2020 Democrats | The 11th Hour | MSNBC
UPDATED DATA 10/28/2019
On a daily basis, Morning Consult is surveying over 5,000 registered voters across the United States on the 2020 presidential election. Every Monday, we’ll update this page with the latest survey data, offering an in-depth guide to how the race for the Democratic nomination is shaping up.
To receive an early look at this report, and other key 2020 data, sign up here.
The figures are broken out among Democratic primary voters nationwide and in early primary states, which includes just voters who live in Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina or Nevada. The latest results are based on 15,431 survey interviews conducted between Oct. 21-27, 2019.
Hover over or click each line to track how support for candidates has changed week to week.
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After voters registered their first choice, they were asked a follow-up about whom they would choose as a second option. The results below show where the supporters for a selection of leading candidates could go next. Hover over or click cards to see more.
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Respondents were asked whether they had a favorable impression of each of the following, and also had the option of saying they hadn’t heard of that person or had no opinion about them.
About Morning Consult Political Intelligence
On a daily basis, Morning Consult surveys over 5,000 registered voters across the United States. Along with 2020 presidential election data, Political Intelligence tracks the approval ratings for all governors, senators, House members, the president, and more at the national, state and congressional district level.
Each week, we will release a report with the most important findings on the 2020 election. Sign up to receive that report in your inbox here.
Results from the most recent update
This page was last updated on October 28, 2019.
Our Democratic primary results are reported using 15,431 interviews with registered voters who indicated they may vote in the Democratic primary or caucus in their state. For those who say don’t know or no opinion, they are asked to pick a candidate they are leaning toward. Results are reported among first choice and those who lean toward a candidate. The interviews were collected October 21-27, 2019, and have a margin of error of +/- 1%. The “Early Primary State Voters” demographic consists of 611 voters in Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina, and has a margin of error of +/- 4%.
In the case of a tie, candidates are ordered alphabetically by last name.
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Joe Biden’s Zombie Campaign
VISION 2020
The Zombie Campaign
Joe Biden is the least formidable front-runner ever. Will it matter?
Inevitably, he arrives late, by SUV or van. The former vice-president is thin and, yes, he’s old. He dresses neatly and always in blue. Staff envelop him. There’s the body man, the advance man, the videographer, the photographer, the digital director, the traveling chief of staff, the traveling press secretary, the local press secretary, the adviser, the other adviser, the adviser’s adviser, the surrogate, the other surrogate, and the bodyguard.
The looming presence of the last guy, Jim, is especially important for optics. Jim is tall and official-looking. He greets the world chest-first, his hands resting in a dignified clasp, his expression even, his mouth unmoving. Most people assume that he’s a Secret Service agent. Which he was.
But ex-VPs don’t get security for life the way ex-presidents do. Most people don’t know that, not even the politically savvy types who attend these sorts of things. And that’s all for the best, because Jim — or whatever local guy they’ve got filling in for him in Iowa or New Hampshire or Nevada or wherever else — is a necessary component of the vibe they’re trying to generate here, the Big Presidential Energy, if you will, that powers this production.
And it is a production. This is true even when the event is small, which it often is, because the stakes never are — Joe Biden speaking off the cuff is something the entire campaign seems focused on preventing at all costs. Inside the community center or union hall or college auditorium, the stage is crafted just so. The red and blue letters — each roughly the size of a 9-year-old — spell IOWA 4 BIDEN. The American flag is stretched taut and stapled to the plywood. The lawn sign is stapled to the lectern. The delicate panes of teleprompter glass angle to meet his hopeful gaze, so that he may absorb the programmed speech as he peers out at his audience, which usually skews quite old and white, unless he’s in South Carolina.
This first part — the reading of the speech — he almost always gets right. Even when he makes changes, rearranging the order of the words, skipping over a few, adding others, how could he not get it right? He’s been delivering some version of it for more than 40 years and living it for longer. He could deliver it in his sleep, if he ever sleeps. It’s like my father always said: Joey, a job is about more than just a paycheck. It’s about your dignity. It’s about being able to look your child in the eye and say, “It’s gonna be okay …” There is an undercurrent of shame that pulses throughout, this idea that the unequalness of our society is embarrassing for those who have access to less, rather than embarrassing for those who have more than anyone could need.
Folks … Not a joke! He’s always saying something rather solemn, about cancer or immigration, and then adding, “Not a joke!” as if anyone thought it might be. I’m being serious here … Come on … The bottom line is … I’m not kidding around … The fact of the matter is … Barack and me … Folks … Folks … Folks … folks … folks … folks … folks … folks … folks … folks … FOLKS … folks … FoLkS … fOlKs … F. O. L. K. S. …
And this next part — the greeting of the voters — he gets right, too. In this context, he possesses an almost mystical quality that, for whatever reason, does not come across when filtered through the kaleidoscope of newsprint or television. It’s the way he focuses his eyes, which are as blue as the seas, except for (yikes) that time the left eye filled with blood on CNN a few weeks back.
He is swarmed. Women reach out to him, linking their arms in his. He bows his head and lifts their hands to his mouth for a kiss and, later, when you ask them if that makes them uncomfortable, they look at you like you have three heads. This is the best day of their lives. Are you insane? There are men, too, who embrace him, wrapping their hands around his neck. He calls every male-presenting human he encounters “man.” I watched him call a baby “man.” As in, Hey! Howareya, man?! He is as skilled a selfie-taker as any influencer, and in the span of 30 or 40 minutes, he snaps hundreds, leaning his body against the rope that separates him from the crowd, straining it one, two, three feet forward. He really does connect with every living being this way, talking about their jobs or their health care as he listens, sometimes crying with them, whispering in their ears, taking their phone numbers and promising to call them. He does, in fact, do that. Everybody is Joe Biden’s long-lost friend. Every baby is Joe Biden’s long-lost child. A little girl in Iowa City called him her uncle Joe. On the Fourth of July in the town of Independence, he took off, running through the parade like a dingo with somebody’s newborn. As hard as it might be to believe that anything in this realm could not be bullshit, it’s simply true that this isn’t.
His own loss is staggering in its scale and cruelty: Neilia, his wife, and Naomi, his infant daughter, killed in a car crash. Beau, his oldest son, who survived that crash with his brother, Hunter, killed decades later by brain cancer. And it’s as though in that loss he’s gained access to an otherwise imperceptible wavelength on which he communicates in this way, with the eyes and the hands.
“I don’t know how to describe it, but sometimes some people would walk up with a lot of emotion in their face, and without even hearing their story, he could connect with them,” John Flynn, who served as Biden’s senior adviser in the White House, said. “He would know it was either one thing or another, and he would just know how to approach them and to get them to gently open up if they wanted to. And if they didn’t want to, he just said, ‘Hey, I’m with you, and I’m there for you. I feel your pain.’ ”
Chris Coons was an intern for Biden in the Senate and is now a United States senator from Delaware himself. He told me about Loretta Wootten, a former colleague who in January went into a coma after a car crash that killed her husband. “I went to visit Loretta when she regained consciousness, and she looks at me, and she says, ‘Does Joe know I’m here?’ That’s her first sentence. I said, ‘I don’t know. I mean, he’s running for president.’ And, she says, ‘I just would love to hear from him.’ The next time I see him, I say, ‘Do you remember Loretta Wootten?’ and he smiles and he says, ‘Of course.’ I said, ‘Well, Loretta’s husband was just killed in a car accident, and she’s in recovery.’ And he gets this look, and he turned to someone and said, ‘Get me a piece of paper.’ And he writes out this page-long, heartfelt message to her, hands it to me, and says, ‘Please get this to her.’ When I delivered that to her, she wept with joy.”
I have witnessed this kind of connection at nearly all of the countless events I’ve attended in a half-dozen states in the six months since Biden announced his campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination. If he ever does sleep, surely Joe Biden dreams as he proselytizes, of an unbroken America, its ideals and reputation restored, where everybody is folks and folks have everything they need and maybe some of what they want, where the field is just even enough that nobody is ashamed of their own place on it, and where the president isn’t an idiot but where you can easily deal with the idiots by kicking the shit out of them out back in a parking lot or something. Crucially, in this dream, Joe Biden is the president.
The pitch goes like this: Joe Biden ought to be the nominee because he’s electable, a meaningless concept if recent history is any guide, and presidential, that wonderful word — the thing Donald Trump could never be even though he literally is president — despite the fact that Biden, who appears by almost any measure to be a good man, a man whose lone sin in life is ego (and does that even count anymore?), has spent a half-century grasping for this position and watching it slip through his fingers.
To anyone paying attention — the army of political professionals more wired to observe shortcomings than are those likely to actually vote for him or for anyone else — it looks, unmistakably, like it’s happening again. His vulnerabilities are close to the surface. There’s the basic fact of his oldness and the concerns, explicit or implicit, about his ability to stay agile and alive for four more years. This was true of Biden, who is 76, even more than it was true of Bernie Sanders, who is the oldest candidate at 78, up until Sanders had a heart attack while campaigning in Nevada earlier this month. (It’s not true at all of Elizabeth Warren, who is 70 but seems a decade younger. And it’s not exactly true of Trump, who is 73 and really just seems crazy, not old.)
But it’s not just his age itself. It’s his tendency to misspeak, his inartful debating style, and — most of all — his status as a creature from another time in the Democratic Party, when the politics of race and crime and gender were unrecognizably different. It’s not just that the Joe Biden of yesteryear sometimes peeks out from behind the No. 1 Obama Stan costume. It’s that the Joe Biden of today is expected to hold his former self accountable to the new standards set by a culture that’s prepared to reject him. And though he’s the party Establishment’s obvious exemplar, he can’t seem to raise any money — spending more in the last quarter than he brought in and moving into the homestretch with less than $9 million in the bank (roughly a third of what Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders has on hand). For political reporters, marveling every day at just how well this isn’t going, watching Biden can feel like being at the rodeo. You’re there because on some level you know you might see someone get killed.
Yet Biden is still the front-runner. Volatile and potentially worthless as they may be, it’s what the polls say. Biden leads the field on average by a handful of percentage points, though his lead has trended steadily downward, from a high of 33 in May to 20 in June to 11, and then to 9.9, and 6.6, and 5.4, according to RealClearPolitics. In the whole campaign, there has only been one day — October 8 — when he slipped to second place, an average of 0.2 points behind Warren. He’s also the front-runner in South Carolina, Nevada, California, Texas, North Carolina, and Florida. “There is this sense of hanging on. And perhaps he can. But that’s generally not the way the physics of these things work,” former Obama adviser David Axelrod told me. “Generally, you’re either moving up or moving down. Warren is clearly moving up. There’s no sign that he is.”
Biden is aware that it’s not going well. But it’s not apparent that he knows how to fix it. Recently, according to his staff, his anxieties have manifested more visibly. If he begins to question something small, he spirals, eventually questioning everything. Should he be saying this in his speech? Wait, should he be giving this speech at all? Should he even be focusing on this group? Is this even the right position? He freaks out over minor stuff on the trail that staffers don’t believe he should be concerning himself with and yet is unable to make strategic adjustments. But the staff concern themselves with unimportant matters, too, running what they think is a general-election campaign when they need to be running a primary. Inside the campaign, the Biden brain trust seems to exist more to comfort the candidate than to compel him, and strategy meetings inevitably devolve into meandering, ruminative roundtables that feel purposeless except to fill time in the day. Nobody will tell the candidate in plain terms what they think he needs to change. Not that Biden really listens anyway.
Some on the campaign still believe he can win, in part because they believe he should win. But even to them, the path to a collapse seems clear: Biden loses in Iowa and New Hampshire, where his leads have been steadily declining for months and where, recently, Elizabeth Warren has overtaken him, and then, as a result, loses his sheer aura of electability, too. But inside the campaign, they reportedly see another path, though it might not seem, at first, an optimistic one: Okay, so he loses Iowa and then New Hampshire, but so what? Because he is who he is and represents what he represents — the embodiment of both the white-working-class model of the electorate and the glow of the Obama years — he can weather the losses and march to victory through Super Tuesday and beyond. “Their theory is a long, twilight struggle where they accumulate delegates everywhere as minority voters start playing a larger role,” Axelrod said. “But in reality, it’s tough to be a winner when you keep losing or at least appear to be.”
Biden would obviously like you to think about his age as experience, but another way of thinking about experience is as a record. He’s got a long one. When he was elected to the Senate, Pete Buttigieg was still a decade away from birth. There’s a lot of material, then, for Biden’s critics to work with. All sorts of stuff that doesn’t age well, or doesn’t quite compute, in this season of absolutism: Anita Hill and allegations that he violated the personal space of several women, controversy over his crusade against busing as a desegregation measure and his eagerness to work with segregationist lawmakers. Last week, after Biden attacked Trump for calling his impeachment a “lynching,” video emerged of Biden calling Bill Clinton’s impeachment the same thing. If it was relevant to American political life at any point since Richard Nixon was president, Biden probably said something about it, but it’s new to many younger voters and activists and talking heads now.
Many of them treat Biden’s talking as yet another symptom of his age, but Biden has always been like this. “His major defect is that he goes on and on and on,” Orrin Hatch told the Washington Post in 1986, when Biden was 43. To say he overcame his childhood stutter would be a bad joke, like one of those I BEAT ANOREXIA T-shirts they sell on the Jersey boardwalk in size XXXL.
In Des Moines, in August, he told a crowd, “Poor kids are just as bright and just as talented as white kids.” Realizing what he’d done, he tried to correct himself. “Wealthy kids,” he said, “black kids, Asian kids. No, I really mean it, but think how we think about it.” Two weeks later, in Keene, New Hampshire, he said, “I love this place. Look, what’s not to like about Vermont in terms of the beauty of it? And what a neat town. This is sort of a scenic, beautiful town.” (When he returned to New Hampshire the following month, a protester held a sign that read WELCOME TO VERMONT, JOE.) And so on.
Biden is cocooned by family, longtime advisers, and former White House staff. His wife Jill, Val, Mike Donilon, Ted Kaufman, Bruce Reed, Annie Tomasini, Tony Blinken, Steve Ricchetti, Ron Klain. But beyond that small circle, veterans are harder to find on his campaign. Biden is chronically slow to make decisions, and his late entry into the race, which came months after many of his competitors, was an additional challenge to staffing the campaign. Many working at Biden headquarters in Philadelphia have no experience on a presidential campaign, and some have never worked on any campaign at all; even those closest to the candidate address him, deferentially, as “sir.”
“Some of these folks who have never worked on a presidential before are like, ‘Okay, I’m working for the former vice-president!’ They don’t really feel like it’s slipping,” one senior campaign adviser told me. “There’s such reverence for getting to work for the vice-president that I think, for some of those folks, there’s a mentality of How could we possibly lose? He’s who he is. I don’t think they see that that’s not all it’s gonna take.” (Yes, even Biden’s staff say “folks” the way others say “like” or “um.”)
For many of these staffers, the campaign feels like it should be a coronation. Joe Biden 2020 isn’t a labor of love or ideology. It’s about the proper order of things. It’s about who’s entitled to what. It’s the vehicle by which the Democratic Party Establishment arrives once more to power, the displaced Obama and Clinton professionals reinstalled at the levers. If the Republic is spared in the process — which everybody genuinely wants, sure! — that’s a plus. And it’s great branding. When it comes to the enthusiasm voters wear on their sleeves for Warren or Sanders, the Biden campaign strikes a cool, dismissive pose, as if it could be believed that a candidate for president weren’t preoccupied with such metrics.
The activist wing of the party is a lost cause to Biden just as he’s a lost cause to them. When they show up at his speeches to confront him or protest in support of the Green New Deal, something I’ve witnessed twice in New Hampshire, he attempts to formulate what he surely believes is a respectful response, and yet they don’t think it’s enough, because nothing that he says could be enough because of who he is. Can you blame anyone under the age of 30 for their cynicism, for their hostility?
“Internally, there was always this idea that there would be some point when he wasn’t No. 1,” one senior campaign adviser swears. “To some extent, people were prepped for that. There isn’t a culture inside the campaign right now like, This is a done deal and we’ve lost. The culture is, This is getting real. People are still reacting to that. The question is: Does this now change our strategy and our culture? That’s where we are right now, figuring out what this new stature means.”
Where they are, if you’re keeping track, is slumped. And it’s a strange dynamic — the most qualified candidate in the race, surrounded by entitled staff who don’t understand that they have to fight for the nomination, or even the presidency, but without a real case to make beyond a Democratic succession that would amount to an Obama restoration. “He has no center,” as one person close to the Biden family put it. “He’s literally only a politician. That’s who he is. That’s all he is. Biden is fundamentally a toadie. He’s just political. He needs to kiss ass? He’ll kiss ass.”
“They have him in the candidate-protection program,” Axelrod says. “I don’t know if you can do that. I don’t know if you can get through a whole campaign that way. Either he can hack it or he can’t hack it. If you’re worried the candidate can hurt himself talking to a reporter, that’s a bad sign.” (Biden declined to be interviewed for this story.)
For his part, Biden is consumed with his endorsements, another sign of his perhaps outdated political instincts; getting insiders to declare their support meant something when powerful political machines controlled the primary process, but it has much less relevance to presidential politics today. And the only endorsement that could matter hasn’t materialized. President Barack Obama has remained silent on the 2020 primary even as he saw it fit to involve himself in Canadian affairs, endorsing Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. A senior White House official, reflecting on Biden’s weakness, told me Biden should have never even entered the race without knowing he’d have the former president’s support.
Of course, that was always less of a sure thing than it might have seemed. In 2016, Obama went all-in for Hillary, even as his vice-president contemplated a run. In the early stages of this race, he didn’t just avoid aligning himself with Biden but gestured toward other candidates, including unlikely contender Deval Patrick, the former governor of Massachusetts, possibly to discourage his former veep from running.
And then there’s Hunter Biden himself, who was going to become an issue one way or another. The 49-year-old son of privilege and tragedy, he has had struggles with addiction and run-ins with the law that have been well-documented. The campaign did its best to control the subject, cooperating with a tell-all interview over the summer in which Hunter candidly discussed his drug use and his relationship with his brother’s widow. This is sometimes how flacks think they’ll get ahead of a story: You neuter the shock value by delivering the shock yourself. But when your son is a central character in an impeachment saga likely to preoccupy all of Washington and political news for six months, it’s a hard thing to get ahead of, especially when you don’t really seem to want to engage.
“It’s sort of bewildering,” Axelrod says. “I guess I understand it from a familial, psychological sense. It would just be so much better if he stated the obvious: Even Hunter has said he exercised poor judgment. He won’t even say what his kid said. It’s an obvious question as to why the rules that he’s going to apply in the future didn’t apply in the past. All this was foreseeable … You can’t say, ‘He did nothing wrong,’ and, ‘He’ll never do it again.’ Those things don’t go together. Biden can be stubborn. I think his stubbornness is showing here.” All of that said, Axelrod added, “what Trump is doing is loathsome and outrageous because there’s no evidence that Biden did anything wrong or that Hunter did anything wrong.”
In a certain sense, impeachment creates for Biden what he wanted all along: a direct competition with Trump. Looked at it one way, it’s a story about how the president of the United States was so worried about his formidable opponent that he risked his entire presidency, and even broke the law, to try to stop him. But in other ways, it’s exactly what Biden hoped to avoid: a focus on his most troubled child, the last remaining member of his first family, and the privilege his political and celebrity status affords. Even if he didn’t do anything “wrong,” Trump is right that there’s a swamp, though he doesn’t realize he’s its ugliest creature, and impeachment is a daily reminder that Biden swims there, too. Who could withstand an entire year of character assassination by the president, who is aided by a political media that projects his every statement to the world?
At the Iowa State Fair in August, as candidates took to the stage to deliver their stump speeches and answer questions from the Des Moines Register, I stood off to the side with a few members of the press. We craned our necks downward to squint at a zoomed-in photo of the side of Joe Biden’s head. There, just behind the ear, is where you can supposedly observe the scar from a face-lift, one of many cosmetic procedures Biden is rumored to have had.
The dramatic change to Biden’s appearance is a matter of preoccupation for Biden-watchers. In the timeline of images from throughout his career, you can observe as he grows older and then younger and then older but somehow more elegant and alert. His hair is white now but thicker than it was in the 1980s. He’s thinner, but his cheeks are fuller than they were in 2008. To be honest with you, he looks good. He’s almost 77!
This is also a minor obsession of the White House, as you can probably imagine. Privately, Trump has marveled at the “work” Biden has had done and the fact that, in his opinion, he doesn’t look any better for it. Those who know him say the president is against plastic surgery (by which I assume they don’t mean breast implants) and, especially, bad plastic surgery, and he considers it an all-too-common tragedy when someone has their face inexpertly altered.
A senior White House official who regularly discusses the campaign with Trump was describing how his view of Biden has evolved since the winter. It was then, before Biden declared, that the campaign began conducting polling and sharing the results with Trump himself. The internal numbers were as bad as the external. Biden destroyed Trump. The president’s anxieties only grew as Biden became a more popular topic on cable news. “It was easy to get caught up,” this official said. “The president saw that it’s easier to picture Joe Biden up on the debate stage than some of the others.”
Over time, as Biden formally waded into the race, and the president saw the reality of the candidate as opposed to the idea of Vice-President Joe Biden, he grew less concerned, according to the senior White House official. Biden was no longer “the guy he was worried about.” And one of the reasons was, in Trumpian fashion, “his look.” Though the official adds a few more items to the list as well: “His cadence. His inability to speak. His small crowds.”
Trump has also commented on Biden’s wardrobe choices, wondering why he’d wear Ralph Lauren polo shirts on the campaign trail that show off his graying chest hair and skinny arms. (Trump himself wears polo shirts almost exclusively while golfing).
Inside the White House and the reelection campaign, the true believers know how to decode Trump’s bitchy nicknames for his competitors. As iconic as “Crooked Hillary” and “Lyin’ Ted” may be, his crowning achievement remains “Low Energy,” his characterization of Jeb Bush. “Sleepy Joe” is considered Trump’s attempt at a 2020 remake of “Low Energy,” and it’s all about emphasizing Biden’s age.
In September, somebody had the bright idea to stage an afternoon event under the open sky at the Indian Creek Nature Center in sunny Cedar Rapids. It was the day after news of the whistle-blower broke, but Biden stuck to the event’s topic, climate change, addressing all the usual themes. Then faces began turning upward to the birds overhead. Somebody from Showtime’s The Circus told me the birds were bald eagles, but at the time I thought they looked like hawks, which, I guess, is a sort of glass-half-empty or -half-full dilemma. Eventually, word of the alleged bald eagles made its way to Biden, and with a look of optimism, he turned his face to the sky. He grew emotional. He said that at the Lake House, Beau used to sit by the water and watch the bald eagles fly overhead. The night Beau died, in 2015, Biden said he watched an eagle take off from the lake, circle in the sky, and then fly away. He hadn’t seen another bald eagle since that night, he said, until now. Looking at the bird, he said, “Maybe that’s my Beau.”
Biden wrote a book about his grief, and about his son, called Promise Me, Dad. Therein, he tells a similar story, but with a different bird. That night, he wrote, “Jill spotted a white egret at the far edge of the water.” She told her husband that, as he lay dying, she whispered to Beau to go to the dock, “his happy place,” with his brother. “We watched the egret for twenty minutes, until it finally took flight,” Biden wrote. “The two of us sat in silence as the egret circled overhead repeatedly, slowly gaining altitude, until it finally headed away to the south, beneath the clouds, and gradually disappeared from sight. ‘It’s a sign from God,’ Jill said. ‘Beau being at the lake one last time, and heading for heaven.’ ”
Anne Kearns is an 84-year-old grandmother of 16 and retired professor. For 58 years, she has lived in the modest blue house with black shutters on North Washington Avenue in Scranton, Pennsylvania, where Joe Biden lived during the first decade of his life.
“He calls this ‘the Homestead,’ ” she told me last Sunday. We were sitting in the living room, surrounded by framed photos of her large family and one photo of Biden, propped up on the TV stand. For most of his career, Biden was among the least-wealthy members of Congress, an attractive bullet point that he continues to note even after amassing a fortune in his post–White House life. He often claims that “they” call him “Middle-Class Joe.” (As far as I can tell, he is the only person who calls himself this.) But he’s always had a weakness for grand old houses, even before he could really afford them, and an odd habit of referring to his properties by nicknames: North Star (for the Delaware village in which it was located), the Station (his once-bustling home in Wilmington), and the Lake House (self-explanatory). What does Anne call the Homestead in which she lives? “Well, nothing,” she said, laughing.
You could tell the story of Biden’s astonishingly long political career through Anne and through this house.
She first learned there was an interesting man who had once lived here in 1972, when she saw Biden’s ads on TV. At the time, he was running for the U.S. Senate against Cale Boggs, a powerful Republican who had won seven consecutive elections in Delaware, climbing from Congress to the governor’s mansion and ultimately to the Senate. Boggs was 63, and Biden, who at 29 wouldn’t even be eligible to serve in the office he was seeking until two weeks after Election Day, used his seniority against him. “We need some new thinking,” read one of Biden’s advertisements. “He understands what’s happening today,” read another. “My husband said to me — he watched him all the time on TV — and he’d say, ‘Ah, he’s going to be something someday,’ ” Anne said.
In 1988, when Biden was running for president the first time, reporters and authors began knocking on Anne’s door. A boy who lived down the street brought her a signed photo Biden had addressed to her, thanking her for her cooperation in this strange endeavor.
By her count, Biden himself has visited the Homestead six times over the years, once privately with his late mother, who refused to get out of the car despite Anne assuring her that the visit was not a disturbance, and other trips with the media and even Hillary Clinton.
“He came another time with Terry Moran from Nightline, and they walked across the street. At that time, I had a leg done, and so my niece was sitting where you are” — she gestured to my chair — “and she said, ‘I think that’s Joe Biden coming.’ I thought, No, he was here two weeks ago. My nephew stood up, and he said, ‘Anne, it is Joe Biden.’ They had left a message on my phone and I didn’t hear it.”
In 2008, the Obama-Biden campaign staged a formal event here with 400 people plus Secret Service sweeping through and rows of seating set up next door for reporters. Biden went upstairs to his old bedroom and signed the wall. Anne keeps photos from that day in an album underneath the television, and in them, Biden can be seen writing in black Sharpie, I AM HOME — JOE BIDEN 9 * 1 * 08. By then, Biden had served in the Senate for 25 years and run for president twice — once disastrously, ending in a plagiarism scandal, and once unremarkably, ending in a vice-presidential campaign.
The whole neighborhood, Anne said, took pride in him, supported him. Even the old lady across the street, whose sons told her she wasn’t allowed to speak to reporters or let them into the house anymore, still loves Joe Biden.
Age isn’t just a weakness for Biden. There are a lot of old people in America, and many of them really like the former vice-president. They don’t see a doddering, out-of-touch, exhausted man, as the 20- and 30- and 40-somethings who cover the campaign and dominate social media do. They look at him and see, well, a statesman from the popular recent administration who has moved to the left as the party has, if not quite as much as his younger rivals. These are the people that really vote in elections, and, to them, that all seems pretty good. “I worry when I read that he is even with somebody. I just read a piece this morning that he’s even with the Warren lady,” Anne said.
“I really think he’d be wonderful in getting us back with the people that are overseas. I think he’s wonderful dealing with people. I would definitely support him. I think he knows what’s going on with all those people … He’s a wonderful man. He really is wonderful, and he cares about people.”
A few days after I left the Homestead, Biden gave a speech at the Scranton Cultural Center. At the last minute, he decided to make an unplanned stop on North Washington Avenue. As photographers snapped away from the sidewalk, Anne answered the door. Biden wrapped her in a hug.
http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/10/joe-biden-2020-campaign.html
CNN Poll: Biden’s lead in Democratic primary hits widest margin since April
By Jennifer Agiesta, CNN Polling Director
Updated 7:28 AM ET, Wed October 23, 2019
WASHINGTON (CNN) Former Vice President Joe Biden’s lead in the race for the Democratic nomination for president has rebounded, and now stands at its widest margin since April, according to a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS.
The study was conducted for CNN via telephone by SSRS, an independent research company. Interviews were
conducted from October 17-20, 2019 among a sample of 1,003 respondents. The landline total respondents were
352 and there were 651 cell phone respondents. The margin of sampling error for total respondents is +/- 3.7 at
the 95% confidence level. The design effect is 1.47.More information about SSRS can be obtained by visiting
http://www.ssrs.com. Question text noted in parentheses was rotated or randomized. Unless otherwise noted, results
beginning with the March 31-April 2, 2006 survey and ending with the April 22-25, 2017 survey are from surveys
conducted by ORC International. Results before March 31, 2006 are from surveys conducted by Gallup.
NOTE ABOUT CROSSTABS
Interviews were conducted among a representative sample of the adult population, age 18 or older, of the United
States. Members of demographic groups not shown in the published crosstabs are represented in the results for
each question in the poll. Crosstabs on the pages that follow only include results for subgroups with a minimum
n=125 unweighted cases. Results for subgroups with fewer than n=125 unweighted cases are not displayed and
instead are denoted with “SN” because samples of that size carry larger margins of sampling error and can be too
small to be projectable with confidence to their true values in the population.
2020 Democratic Party presidential primaries
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1,885 of 3,769[a] pledged delegate votes needed to win the presidential nomination at the convention‘s first ballot.[1]
(2,268 of all 4,535[b] delegate votes needed to win any subsequent ballots at a contested convention)[1]
Hillary Clinton
2020 U.S. presidential election
The 2020 Democratic Party presidential primaries and caucuses will be a series of electoral contests organized by the Democratic Party to select the approximately 3,769[a] pledged delegates to the Democratic National Convention. Those delegates shall, by pledged votes, elect the Democratic nominee for president of the United States in the 2020 U.S. presidential election.[2] The elections are scheduled to take place from February to June 2020 in all fifty U.S. states, the District of Columbia, five U.S. territories, and Democrats Abroad.
Independently of the result of primaries and caucuses, the Democratic Party will—from its group of party leaders and elected officials—also appoint 765[b] unpledged delegates (superdelegates) to participate in its national convention. In contrast to all previous election cycles, superdelegates will no longer have the right to cast decisive votes at the convention’s first ballot for the presidential nomination (limiting their voting rights to either non-decisive votes on the first ballot or decisive votes for subsequent ballots on a contested convention).[2][3][4]
The field of major Democratic presidential candidates in the 2020 election peaked at more than two dozen. As of October 24, 2019, 18 major candidates are seeking the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020. The October 15, 2019 Democratic presidential debate in Westerville, Ohio featured 12 candidates, setting a record for the highest number of candidates in one presidential debate.
Contents
Background[edit]
After Hillary Clinton‘s loss in the previous election, many felt the Democratic Party lacked a clear leader.[5] There remained divisions in the party following the 2016 primaries which pitted Clinton against Bernie Sanders.[6][7] Between the 2016 election and the 2018 midterm elections, Senate Democrats have generally shifted to the political left in relation to college tuition, healthcare, and immigration.[8][9] The 2018 elections saw the Democratic Party regain the House of Representatives for the first time in eight years, picking up seats in both urban and suburban districts.[10][11]
Soon after the 2016 general election, the division between Clinton and Sanders supporters was highlighted in the 2017 Democratic National Committee chairmanship election between Tom Perez and Keith Ellison.[12] Perez was narrowly elected chairman and subsequently appointed Ellison as the Deputy Chair, a largely ceremonial role.[8][9]
The 2020 field of Democratic presidential candidates peaked at more than two dozen candidates. According to Politifact, this field is believed to be the largest field of presidential candidates for any American political party since 1972;[c] it exceeds the field of 17 major candidates that sought the Republican presidential nomination in 2016.[14] In May 2019, CBS News referred to the field of 2020 Democratic presidential candidates as “the largest and most diverse Democratic primary field in modern history”.[15] As of October 24, 2019, 18 major candidates are seeking the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020.[16] The October 15, 2019 Democratic presidential debate in Westerville, Ohio featured 12 candidates, setting a record for the highest number of candidates in one presidential debate.[17][18]
Reforms since 2016[edit]
On August 25, 2018, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) members passed reforms to the Democratic Party’s primary process in order to increase participation[19] and ensure transparency.[20] State parties are encouraged to use a government-run primary whenever available and increase the accessibility of their primary through same-day or automatic registration and same-day party switching. Caucuses are required to have absentee voting, or to otherwise allow those who cannot participate in person to be included.[19]
The new reforms also regulate how the Democratic National Convention shall handle the outcome of primaries and caucuses for three potential scenarios:[2][4]
The reforms mandate that superdelegates refrain from voting on the first presidential nominating ballot, unless a candidate via the outcome of primaries and caucuses already has gained enough votes (more than 50% of all delegate votes) among only the elected pledged delegates. The prohibition for superdelegates to vote at the first ballot for the last two mentioned scenarios, does not preclude superdelegates from publicly endorsing a candidate of their choosing before the convention.[4]
In a contested convention where no majority of minimum 1,886 pledged delegate votes is found for a single candidate in the first ballot, all superdelegates will then regain their right to vote on any subsequent ballot necessary in order for a presidential candidate to be nominated (raising the majority needed for such to 2,267 votes).[2][4]
Candidates[edit]
Major candidates in the 2020 Democratic presidential primaries have either: (a) served as Vice President, a member of the cabinet, a U.S. Senator, a U.S. Representative, or a Governor, (b) been included in a minimum of five independent national polls, or (c) received substantial media coverage.[21][22][23][24][25][26]
More than 250 candidates who did not meet the above-referenced criteria to be deemed major candidates also filed with the Federal Election Commission to run for president in the Democratic Party primary.[27]
Current candidates[edit]
The following list of current candidates includes major candidates that have filed with the Federal Election Commission to run for president in the 2020 Democratic primary, have officially announced their respective candidacies, and have not withdrawn their candidacies. As of October 24, 2019, the total number of current candidates is 18.
Announcement date
Michael Bennet
(age 54)
New Delhi, India
Colorado
Campaign
Campaign: May 2, 2019
FEC filing[28]
Joe Biden
(age 76)
Scranton, Pennsylvania
U.S. senator from Delaware (1973–2009)
Candidate for President in 1988 and 2008
Delaware
Campaign
Campaign: April 25, 2019
FEC filing[30]
Cory Booker
(age 50)
Washington, D.C.
Mayor of Newark, New Jersey (2006–2013)
New Jersey
Campaign
Campaign: February 1, 2019
FEC filing[32]
Steve Bullock
(age 53)
Missoula, Montana
Attorney General of Montana (2009–2013)
Montana
Campaign
Campaign: May 14, 2019
FEC filing[34]
Pete Buttigieg
(age 37)
South Bend, Indiana
Indiana
Campaign
Exploratory committee: January 23, 2019
Campaign: April 14, 2019
FEC filing[37]
Julián Castro
(age 45)
San Antonio, Texas
Mayor of San Antonio, Texas (2009–2014)
Texas
Campaign
Exploratory committee:
December 12, 2018
Campaign: January 12, 2019
FEC filing[39]
John Delaney
(age 56)
Wood-Ridge, New Jersey
Maryland
Campaign
Campaign: July 28, 2017
FEC filing[41]
Tulsi Gabbard
(age 38)
Leloaloa, American Samoa
Hawaii
Campaign
Campaign: January 11, 2019
FEC filing[43]
Kamala Harris
(age 55)
Oakland, California
Attorney General of California (2011–2017)
California
Campaign
Campaign: January 21, 2019
FEC filing[45]
Amy Klobuchar
(age 59)
Plymouth, Minnesota
Minnesota
Campaign
Campaign: February 10, 2019
FEC filing[47]
Wayne Messam
(age 45)
South Bay, Florida
Florida
Campaign
Exploratory committee:
March 13, 2019
Campaign: March 28, 2019
FEC filing[49]
Beto O’Rourke
(age 47)
El Paso, Texas
Texas
Campaign
Campaign: March 14, 2019
FEC filing[51]
Bernie Sanders
(age 78)
Brooklyn, New York
U.S. representative from VT-AL (1991–2007)
Mayor of Burlington, Vermont (1981–1989)
Candidate for President in 2016
Vermont
Campaign
Campaign: February 19, 2019
FEC filing[53]
Joe Sestak
(age 67)
Secane, Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania
Campaign: June 22, 2019
FEC filing[55]
Tom Steyer
(age 62)
Manhattan, New York
Founder of Farallon Capital
California
Campaign
Campaign: July 9, 2019
FEC filing[57]
Elizabeth Warren
(age 70)
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Special Advisor for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (2010–2011)
Massachusetts
Campaign
Exploratory committee:
December 31, 2018
Campaign: February 9, 2019
FEC filing[59]
Marianne Williamson
(age 67)
Houston, Texas
Founder of Project Angel Food
Independent candidate for U.S. House from CA-33 in 2014
California
Campaign
Exploratory committee:
November 15, 2018
Campaign: January 28, 2019
FEC filing[61]
Andrew Yang
(age 44)
Schenectady, New York
Founder of Venture for America
New York
Campaign
Campaign: November 6, 2017
FEC filing[63]
Beside these major candidates, more than 250 other candidates who did not meet the above-referenced criteria to be deemed major candidates also filed with the Federal Election Commission to run for president in the Democratic Party primary.[65] Other notable candidates who have not suspended their respective campaigns include:
Candidates who withdrew from the race before the 2020 primaries[edit]
The candidates in this section were major candidates who withdrew or suspended their campaigns before the 2020 Democratic primary elections began.
announced
suspended
Richard Ojeda
(age 48)
Rochester, Minnesota
West Virginia
FEC filing[77]
Eric Swalwell
(age 38)
Sac City, Iowa
California
(running for re-election)
Campaign
FEC filing[80]
Mike Gravel
(age 89)
Springfield, Massachusetts
Candidate for President in 2008
California
Exploratory committee: March 19, 2019–
April 1, 2019
(co-endorsed Sanders and Gabbard)[83]
Campaign
FEC filing[84]
John Hickenlooper
(age 67)
Narberth, Pennsylvania
Mayor of Denver, Colorado (2003–2011)
Colorado
(running for U.S. Senate)[86]
Campaign
FEC filing[87]
Jay Inslee
(age 68)
Seattle, Washington
U.S. representative from WA-01 (1999–2012)
Washington
(running for re-election)[90]
Campaign
FEC filing[91]
Seth Moulton
(age 41)
Salem, Massachusetts
Massachusetts
(running for re-election)[94]
Campaign
FEC filing[95]
Kirsten Gillibrand
(age 52)
Albany, New York
U.S. representative from NY-20 (2007–2009)
New York
Exploratory committee: January 15, 2019–
March 16, 2019
Campaign
FEC filing[98]
Bill de Blasio
(age 58)
Manhattan, New York
New York
Campaign
FEC filing[101]
Tim Ryan
(age 46)
Niles, Ohio
U.S. representative from OH-17 (2003–2013)
Ohio
(running for re-election)[104]
Campaign
FEC filing[105]
The following notable individuals who did not meet the criteria to become major candidates have terminated their respective campaigns:
Potential major candidates[edit]
The persons listed in this section have, as of October 22, 2019, reportedly considered presidential bids within the past six months and would be major candidates.
Former Mayor
Michael Bloomberg
from New York
Former Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton
from New York
Former Attorney General
Eric Holder
from Washington D.C.
Declined to be candidates[edit]
These individuals have been the subject of presidential speculation, but have publicly denied or recanted interest in running for president.
Political positions of candidates[edit]
Debates[edit]
In December 2018, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) announced the preliminary schedule for 12 official DNC-sanctioned debates, set to begin in June 2019, with six debates in 2019 and the remaining six during the first four months of 2020. Candidates are allowed to participate in forums featuring multiple other candidates as long as only one candidate appears on stage at a time; if candidates participate in any unsanctioned debate with other presidential candidates, they will lose their invitation to the next DNC-sanctioned debate.[192][193]
If any debates will be scheduled to take place with a location in the first four primary/caucus states (Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina), the DNC has decided such debates, at the earliest, will be held in 2020.[192] The DNC also announced that it would not partner with Fox News as a media sponsor for any debates.[194][195] Fox News had last held a Democratic debate in 2003.[196] All media sponsors selected to host a debate will as a new rule be required to appoint at least one female moderator for each debate, to ensure there will not be a gender skewed treatment of the candidates and debate topics.[197]
(ET)
(15.3m live TV; 9m streaming)
Miami, Florida
MSNBC
Telemundo
Savannah Guthrie
Lester Holt
Rachel Maddow
Chuck Todd
[200][201]
(18.1m live TV; 9m streaming)
(8.7m live TV; 2.8m streaming)
Detroit, Michigan
Don Lemon
Jake Tapper
(10.7m live TV; 3.1m streaming)
Texas Southern University,
Houston, Texas
Univision
David Muir
Jorge Ramos
George Stephanopoulos
Otterbein University,
Westerville, Ohio
The New York Times
Anderson Cooper
Marc Lacey
Atlanta, Georgia
The Washington Post
Andrea Mitchell
Ashley Parker
Kristen Welker
Los Angeles, California
PBS
Primary election polling[edit]
The following graph depicts the evolution of the standing of each candidate in the poll aggregators since December 2018.
updated
polled
Biden
Warren
Sanders
Buttigieg
Harris
Yang
O’Rourke
Klobuchar
Booker
Timeline[edit]
Overview[edit]
campaign
committee
candidate
elections
caucuses
Tuesday
convention
2017[edit]
John Delaney was the first major candidate to announce his campaign, two and a half years before the 2020 Iowa caucus.
In the weeks following the election of Donald Trump in the 2016 election, media speculation regarding potential candidates for the 2020 Democratic Party presidential primaries began to circulate. As the Senate began confirmation hearings for members of the cabinet, speculation centered on the prospects of the “hell-no caucus”, six senators who went on to vote against the majority of Trump’s nominees. According to Politico, the members of the “hell-no caucus” were Cory Booker, Kamala Harris, Kirsten Gillibrand, Bernie Sanders, Jeff Merkley, and Elizabeth Warren.[218][219] Other speculation centered on then-Vice-President Joe Biden making a third presidential bid following failed attempts in 1988 and 2008. Biden had previously served as U.S. senator from Delaware (1973–2009).[220]
2018[edit]
Entrepreneur Andrew Yang was the second major Democratic candidate to announce his campaign.
In August 2018, Democratic Party officials and television networks began discussions as to the nature and scheduling of the following year’s debates and the nomination process.[223] Changes were made to the role of superdelegates, deciding to only allow them to vote on the first ballot if the nomination is uncontested.[224] The Democratic National Committee (DNC) announced the preliminary schedule for the 12 official DNC-sanctioned debates, set to begin in June 2019, with six debates in 2019 and the remaining six during the first four months of 2020.
On November 6, 2018, the 2018 midterm elections were held. The election was widely characterized as a “blue wave” election. Mass canvassing, voter registration drives and deep engagement techniques drove turnout high. Despite this, eventual presidential candidates U.S. Representative Beto O’Rourke of Texas and State Senator Richard Ojeda of West Virginia both lost their respective races.[225]
August
November
December
2019
Rep. Tulsi Gabbard announced her candidacy on January 11, 2019.
Sen. Kamala Harris launched her bid on January 21, 2019.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren launched her bid on February 9, 2019
Sen. Bernie Sanders launched his second campaign on February 19, 2019.
Rep. Beto O’Rourke launched his bid on March 14, 2019.
Mayor Pete Buttigieg launched his campaign on April 14, 2019.
Former Vice President Joe Biden launched his third campaign on April 25, 2019.
January
February
March
April
May
June
July
August
September
October
November
December
Primary and caucus calendar
Democratic primary and caucus calendar by currently scheduled date
February
March 3 (Super Tuesday)
March 10
March 17
March 24
April 4–7
April 28
May
June
No scheduled 2020 date
The following primary and caucus dates have been scheduled by state statutes or state party decisions, but are subject to change pending legislation, state party delegate selection plans, or the decisions of state secretaries of state:[324]
The 57 states, districts, territories, or other constituencies with elections of pledged delegates to decide the Democratic presidential nominee, currently plan to hold the first major determining step for these elections via 50 primaries[l] and seven caucuses (Iowa, Nevada, Wyoming, and four territories).[324] The number of states holding caucuses decreased from 14 in the 2016 nomination process to only three in 2020.[330][331]
National convention
The 2020 Democratic National Convention is scheduled to take place in Milwaukee, Wisconsin on July 13–16, 2020.[332][333][334]
In addition to Milwaukee, the DNC also considered bids from three other cities: Houston, Texas;[335] Miami Beach, Florida;[336] and Denver, Colorado. Denver, though, was immediately withdrawn from consideration by representatives for the city, who cited scheduling conflicts.[337]
Endorsements
Campaign finance
This is an overview of the money being raised and spent by each campaign for the entire period running from January 1, 2017 to September 30, 2019, as it was reported to the Federal Election Commission (FEC). Total raised are the sum of all individual contributions (large and small), loans from the candidate, and transfers from other campaign committees. The last column, Cash On Hand (COH), has been calculated by subtracting the “spent” amount from the “raised” amount, thereby showing the remaining cash each campaign had available for its future spending as of September 30, 2019. In total the candidates have raised $476,284,606.
donations
(as % of
ind.contrib)
See also
Notes
References …
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_Democratic_Party_presidential_primaries
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